Key energy and environmental positions in Obama’s cabinet impress environmentalists

Articles — By forcechange on December 11, 2008 9:41 am

The key energy and environmental positions in President-elect Obama’s cabinet have been identified and are bringing praise from environmentalists.  

For Energy secretary, Obama chose physicist Steven Chu.  Chu won a Nobel Prize for the “development of methods to cool and trap atoms with laser light,” and is the director of the Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory.  Under Chu’s leadership, the lab has focused on alternative energy research and efforts to boost energy efficiency in buildings.

For head of the EPA, Obama picked former New Jersey environmental protection commissioner Lisa Jackson.  Jackson previously worked for the EPA for 16 years before she joined the New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection, which she has run since 2006.  She also supported efforts to create a cap-and-trade system among Northeastern states.

Obama chose Carol Browner, a former EPA administrator, to serve as a high-level coordinator on energy issues.  Browner was in charge of the EPA under Clinton from 1993 to 2001.  She is also leading Obama’s energy and environment transition team.  She is on the boards of the National Audubon Society and Gore’s Alliance for Climate Protection.

Additionally, Obama plans to name Nancy Sutley, the Los Angeles deputy mayor, to be head of the White House Council on Environmental Quality.  There is no word yet on who will be his Interior secretary.

Environmentalists have shown enthusiastic support for Obama’s picks, believing that they indicate a real commitment to environmental and energy policies.

A leading oil industry group, the American Petroleum Institute, offered no criticism of the appointments, stating, “We look forward to working with all the Obama appointees to come up with a comprehensive, fact-based and realistic energy policy that will benefit the American people.”  Apparently they have decided to pick their battles…