By now you’ve heard of the oil spill that is wreaking havoc in the Gulf. It’s tragic and horrible and all of the other adjectives you want to use that have to do with the destruction of valuable and iconic environmental areas. What are we going to do with a bunch of oil in the Gulf of Mexico? And it’s still pouring out.

I listened to an NPR set of interviews and report yesterday and was astounded to hear BP executives say that the triple-backed up safeguard system that they had was not triggered or turned on until almost 3 days after the leak began. What good is an oil spill safeguard if you don’t use it until 72 hours later? And my favorite part is that they are then thinking about how to build a new machine, like a giant science fiction robot, that is going to go out, find the leak, and jam some kind of device into it and unload a whole bunch of concrete to stop the leak once and for all and close the oil well forever. Right.

Our Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security told a news conference that this spill was/ is “of national significance,” and why shouldn’t it be? It’s going to destroy a good amount of the Gulf coast starting tomorrow, as oil starts to wash up on the beaches and national preserves. Not to mention the levees around New Orleans, which has seen more than its fair share of devastation in the past decade.

Louisiana has declared a state of emergency. The Coast Guard says 5 times as much oil is spilling as was originally expected. It’s a madhouse out there.

BP and the Coast Guard have teamed up to initiate and carry out the largest oil spill containment operation, well, ever, and it’s still not stopping the problem. So what does this mean for the offshore oil drilling business as a whole? It means BP’s shares will go down for a little while, then back up and things will go back to normal for everyone except the folks who live along the shores that are being destroyed, and of course all of the wildlife.

In my book, this is the perfect opportunity to step back and think about what is going on. This is a disaster that will have a similar impact to the hurricane, at least on the environmental health of the coast. There will be “serious damage to fisheries, wildlife refuges and beaches in Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama and Florida,” according to Reuters.

210,000 gallons (795,000 liters) of oil are spilling into the Gulf E-V-E-R-Y DAY. It’s ridiculous. It’s stupid.

And it’s a perfect reason to sit down and think about why we should be putting money into solar panels and windmills rather than expending political capital on trying to get some modifications on the Atlantic and Pacific drilling moratorium through Congress. That happened the last time we screwed up and spilled all over Santa Barbara. This is the same thing- bigger maybe. But in concept, it’s a timely reminder of what the real goals for the climate change bill should be.

Image Credit: SkyTruth