| quote: |
| "Yeah, a tibanna gas mine. Lando conned somebody out of it." |
―Han Solo[src]
Tibanna was a rare form of matter found in both gas and liquid form. In its natural state as a gas, tibanna comprised the atmospheres of several planets, most notably that of Bespin, where it was processed at Cloud City, and the planets Genarius, Kaer, Kril'Dor, Ord Ibanna, Rendili, Taloraan and Yorn Skot.
Tibanna gas was excreted by beldons, huge gas-filled creatures. The gas was a byproduct of the vapors consumed by beldons. Tibanna was extracted from Bespin's atmosphere as atmospheric gases rose on updrafts through Cloud City's unipod. The gas was then processed and packed in carbonite for transport off-planet.
Tibanna gas produced four times its normal energy output when cohesive light passed through it. Thus, spin-sealed (compacted at the atomic level) tibanna was used as a conducting agent in blasters and other energy weapons, producing greater energy yields and thus greater amounts of damage. Most personal weapons could not tolerate this power boost, but ship-mounted blasters benefited greatly from the use of tibanna gas. Exceptions to this were the DC series rifles of BlasTech Industries, which used tibanna gas to produce powerful ionized bolts that were damaging to both organics and droids, something that was crucial to winning the Clone Wars. Tibanna was also used to make a useful variant of the DC series ionized bolt, which made the weapons' energy output imperceptible to the naked eye.
The spin-sealing process was prohibitively expensive except on Bespin, where it occurred naturally. Non-spin-sealed tibanna gas was used as hyperdrive coolant.
Gas giants with significant amounts of tibanna were known to possess a layer called tibanisphere.