Climate first for Obama transition team

After eight years out in the cold, Democrats in Washington DC are rushing to warm themselves by the White House fireplace. And although research advocates may have to wait to see major science-policy positions in the new administration filled, a sense of the next president's priorities and style of governance is starting to emerge... [snip]

Podesta, who trained in psychology as an undergraduate before going on to study law, founded the liberal think tank Center for American Progress (CAP) in 2003. The Washington-based group includes a number of leading scholars in science, including Thomas Kalil — another Clinton-White-House veteran, now at the University of California, Berkeley — who served as a science adviser to the Obama campaign.

The transition team declines interviews, but the CAP may provide some clues to how certain issues may fare under an Obama presidency — chief among them energy and climate. In a book published this week, Change for America: A Progressive Blueprint for the 44th President, the think tank outlines its case for a 'national energy council' that would coordinate energy policy among the various agencies and departments with a stake in such issues.

The creation of such a council, under an 'energy czar', would provide a coordinating role not seen before...

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