Eye on the Market | November 21, 2011 J.P Morgan Topic: The quixotic search for energy solutions A setback for nuclear, and some investment consequences The saddest energy moment of the year was the failure of the Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear power plant in March. Weaknesses of the original design and actions taken in the immediate aftermath of a massive tsunami combined to produce a disaster: the latest studies show emissions of radioactive cesium that are equal to half of the release from Chernobyl. The concept of nuclear power is one of man’s greatest achievements, but generating it safely and in a cost-effective way (including decommissioning) makes it a difficult undertaking. In some ways, nuclear’s goose was cooked by 1992, when the cost of building a 1 GW plant rose by a factor of 5 (in real terms) from 1972. Before he died, father of the hydrogen bomb Edward Teller’s last paper argued that nuclear power plants (molten salt reactors, specifically) do not belong on the surface of the earth, and belong underground instead, to deal with the clean-up and failure, if it happened. And that’s from one of nuclear power’s greatest supporters. From a broader perspective, the era of cheap oil appears to be over. As shown below in the first chart, almost the entire future increase in oil supplies projected by the EIA are based on unconventional supplies (tar sands, deep-sea drilling, enhanced oil recovery, oil shale, etc.), with the word “unconventional” being shorthand for “more expensive”. As for natural gas, as shown in the second chart, EJA projections assume that rising U.S. shale gas production, with all its uncertainties in terms of associated costs, will offset declines in almost every other category. It is hard to precisely quantify the speed bump on growth that this creates for the world, and as things stand night now, deleveraging of household, corporate and sovereign balance sheets in the US and Europe is a much bigger risk for financial markets. As I write thi