Giedi Prime

Giedi Prime is an industrial wasteland with a low photosynthetic potential, the planet's bio-resources depleted and its environment fouled with industrial pollution.[4] Rich in mineral resources, the economy of the planet is based on mining, refineries, and industrial manufacture. In Dune, Baron Vladimir Harkonnen and his heirs live in the "family city of Harko."[4]

Due to its ravaged environment, Giedi Prime has to import almost all of its food. Society on Giedi Prime has evolved around power and conquest, and the weak rarely survive. Gladiatorial games are a common form of entertainment, particularly for nobility, and vocational combat training from an early age is the norm in all classes of society. Slavery is legal and widely practised, while judicial punishment is usually draconian. Such conditions form the basis for a vast military-industrial complex and an army conditioned by fear, which make House Harkonnen the sole contender for House Atreides — or the throne — in terms of military power.

Seems the oil cartel wants to do the same to planet earth.

"I was just appalled at this collaboration ... to create these regulations based on the false premise that fracking is inevitable," said Sandra Steingraber, an Illinois native and founder of New Yorkers Against Fracking, a group whose champions include actor Mark Ruffalo and singer Natalie Merchant. "It was not their job to help pave the way for fracking to move into Illinois. It was to protect the environment."

But Michigan's largest environmental coalition might be willing to take a cue from Illinois if lawmakers decide that fracking should be part of Michigan's energy mix.

"We would love to see that kind of bipartisan cooperation," said Hugh McDiarmid, spokesman for the Michigan Environmental Council. The Illinois bill "has a lot of good ideas and a lot of things ... that mirror what we're trying to achieve in Michigan" because stopping or banning fracking would be unrealistic.

Solar costs are dropping like a stone but we continue to invest in tech that will kill us off. Simply unbelievable in this day and age but there is an alternative if we have the courage to grasp it.

Rob Wile uses a graph to point out the obvious, the dramatic fall in the cost of solar power generation. In many countries– Italy, Spain, Germany, Portugal — and in parts of the US such as the Southwest, solar is at grid parity. That means it is as inexpensive to build a solar plant as a gas or coal one. The pace of technological innovation in the solar field has also accelerated, so that costs have started falling precipitously and efficiency is rapidly increasing. By 2015, solar panels should have fallen to 42 cents per watt. Reneweconomy.com says that the best Chinese solar panels fell in cost by 50% between 2009 and 2012. That incredible achievement is what has driven so many solar companies bankrupt– if you have the older technology, your panels are suddenly expensive and you can’t compete. It is like no one wants a 4 year old computer. Conservatives shed no tears when better computers drive slower ones out of the market, but point to solar companies’ shake-out as somehow bad or unnatural. No wonder US solar installations jumped 76% in 2012. The reductions in cost over the next two years are expected to continue, at a slowing but still impressive 30% rate:

So why are we allowing this to happen when clean tech like solar and wind continue to drop in price. Sheeple, wake up. When aquifers are gone, they are gone forever and PA is beginning to see the real "benefits" of fracking, the literal raping of our planet. 

Combine fracking with Keystone XL and earth may become the next Giedi Prime. Sounds pretty good to me, right?