energy dinosaurs get trampled in the rush

The explosion of both shale and natural gas has seen a huge rethink by the nuclear industry. The head of General Electric, one of the world's largest nuclear reactor manufacturers and reactor builders, had this to say:

"It's just hard to justify nuclear. Really hard. Gas is so cheap and at some point, really, economics rule ... So I think some combination of gas, and either wind or solar ... that's where we see most countries around the world going."

So cheap plentiful gas looks to revolutionize the world's energy industries and looks to be the creator of huge financial duds.

I believe I can see some big boys taking a hit soon and their share price won't be worth peanuts for a while.

This is really going to hurt those big equity holders and possibly rattle the cages of Superfunds' earnings. On the other side of the ledger it could be that energy development could be slow off the ground because of low gas prices but the potential for solid long term cash flows seems irresistible.

Coal and uranium should slide slowly out the investment door as gas will provide global energy supply and price stability.

Oil producers are going to face a very insecure future. The nature of these changes are both interesting and dangerous in that we are watching a global phenomenon in the making.

Yet countries that rely solely on oil exports may have to cope with a massive drop in earnings as low gas prices compete for oil compatible energy generation as does shale oil production. Inefficient economies will become dangerous places as revolutionary trends emerge.

China sits on massive gas reserves and must be now looking at replacing those expensive and unpopular nuclear reactors in the future.

Coal is facing much the same problem as IO as prices fall; due to the US moving from coal to gas. That has left an oversupply moving onto a ramped up supply chain.

Uranium isn't only a dirty word, it looks to becoming, like coal, a dinosaur, a fossil if you'll pardon the pun.