A solar farm plays an important role in the film Gattaca.
A solar farm plays an important role in the film Gattaca. Columbia Picures

It is one of the most beautiful moments in '90s cinema. It is in Gattaca. It happens like this: After a date that goes a bit badly, Vincent (Ethan Hawke), a genetic mess of a human, takes Irene (Uma Thurman), a human in a state of genetic excellence, to a solar farm to watch the sunrise. In reality, this is the Kramer Junction Solar Electric Generating Station. At peak, it generates 354 megawatts; and at the time it entered the history of cinema, it was the second largest solar plant in the world.

For many years now, California has been the state most pregnant with America's future. That state opened this week the largest solar plant in the world, Desert Sunlight, which generates 550 megawatts (enough power for 160,000 homes). This is a big deal. And it may point to one reason for the recent collapse of oil prices.

The leading idea in the past was that as we moved into the future, oil would become more and more expensive as it became more and more scarce or costly to extract. But because the future is more and more looking like it will have other sources of energy (even Apple, a corporation that can do no wrong when comes to making money, wants a piece of this action, and some analysts are even seeing solar as the next revolution after shale), oil producers are dumping their supply on a world that is still very dependent on it. This idea first came to me from Eric Arrr, who posted it in the comments for "Gas Is Cheap Again Because Saudi Arabia Is Trying to Hurt..."