Chu Is Chosen

U.S. energy policy will no longer be made by lobbyists meeting in secret. Barack Obama's picks to lead the government on energy and the environment have the brains and experience to develop policy without relying on position papers presented by oil companies. The New York Times has the names:

The officials said Mr. Obama would name Steven Chu, the director of the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, as his energy secretary, and Nancy Sutley, deputy mayor of Los Angeles for energy and environment, as head of the White House Council on Environmental Quality. Mr. Obama also appears ready to name Carol M. Browner, the E.P.A. administrator under President Bill Clinton, as the top White House official on climate and energy policy and Lisa P. Jackson, who until recently was New Jersey’s commissioner of environmental protection, as the head of the E.P.A.

Chu was awarded the Nobel Prize for physics in 1997 for using laser light to capture and cool atoms to within a fraction of a degree of absolute zero. According to his official bio, he has "reinvigorated Berkeley Lab’s existing programs for energy-efficient buildings, more powerful batteries, and monitoring greenhouse gases."
Carol Browner would be the third former cabinet level official to accept a policy position in Obama's White House, the first two being Lawrence Summers, who served as Treasury Secretary, and former Federal Reserve chairman Paul Volcker.
Gene Karpinski, the president of the League of Conservation Voters, today called the group "a green dream team." The picks are expected to be formally presented next week.