Very upsetting.  Based on FMFats comment in FFAF, I went searching and found this press release posted just minutes ago by FDIC…

Decatur First Bank, Decatur, Georgia, was closed today by the Georgia Department of Banking and Finance, which appointed the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC) as receiver. To protect the depositors, the FDIC entered into a purchase and assumption agreement with Fidelity Bank, Atlanta, Georgia, to assume all of the deposits of Decatur First Bank.

The five branches of Decatur First Bank will reopen during their normal business hours beginning Saturday as branches of Fidelity Bank. Depositors of Decatur First Bank will automatically become depositors of Fidelity Bank. Deposits will continue to be insured by the FDIC, so there is no need for customers to change their banking relationship in order to retain their deposit insurance coverage up to applicable limits. Customers of Decatur First Bank should continue to use their existing branch until they receive notice from Fidelity Bank that it has completed systems changes to allow other Fidelity Bank branches to process their accounts as well.

This evening and over the weekend, depositors of Decatur First Bank can access their money by writing checks or using ATM or debit cards. Checks drawn on the bank will continue to be processed. Loan customers should continue to make their payments as usual.

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Line for Jimmy John’s $1 subs yesterday along West Ponce de Leon Ave, Decatur GA (pic submitted by Nick)

Nora writes in…

We found a dog on Thursday evening (10/20) runnning down the middle of College Avenue in front of Trackside Tavern. Sweet dog. Male, black with white markings. A border collie/pit bull mix maybe? About 50 lbs. Collar obviously lost. No chip. Knows commands. Young. Please contact me for his retrieval. 404.372.1430.

Sheri sends in all the info…

Click to enlarge!

Sure, you could sit around and shake your head about Georgia’s 1973 “Territorial Electric Service Act“, and then spit out your morning cuppa when you hear Georgia Power’s defense of the law that prohibits selling power to anyone but a utility.  In the words of GPB “…the current law protects consumers and costs they pay. If some customers leave for third party suppliers, those remaining with a utility have to shoulder more of infrastructure maintenance costs.”

Umm…OK.

But really, it’s just a waste of perfectly good fair-trade coffee to expectorate your surprise, because guess what?  Solar power is getting cheaper by the day and silly arguments like the one above will be swept into the gutter as eco-freaks and neo-nomics alike will demand more solar options.

Why the cocky confidence?

Because price is the only real remaining hurdle for solar power to overcome and become the energy of choice for any reason.  Sure, if solar got a bit cheaper than its current price, more environmentally conscious folks would be up on their roofs installing panels.  But we’re not talking about a small price decline. We’re talking about the potential of costs so low that fossil fuels aren’t even a consideration anymore.  According to a recent article on Grist by solar expert Kees Van Der Leen, if solar PV capacity continues to grow at just half the rate it grew from 2005 to 2010 (49%), solar will become the cheapest energy option in the sunniest areas of the world by 2018.  6 years from now.  As capacity grows in the years following, the obvious result is solar eventually can become the cheapest option most anywhere in the world.

If it plays out the way it looks like it will, it’s a mind-blowing proposition.  One that will change the way the world thinks about and uses energy forever.  But few are talking about it yet.

They should be.  Because “the amount of solar energy reaching the surface of the planet is so vast that in one year it is about twice as much as will ever be obtained from all of the Earth’s non-renewable resources of coal, oil, natural gas, and mined uranium combined.”, according to one Stanford study.

Hot damn.