Obama Choices for Top Energy and Environment Posts Combine Expertise and Diversity

President-elect Barack Obama is close to announcing who he will appoint to fill several key energy and environmental posts in his administration.

Although no official announcement has been made as yet, word of Obama’s choices is starting to circulate and the president-elect is now expected to name his top energy and environmental advisors next week.

Judging from early reports, it looks as though Obama is going for a combination of scientific knowledge and policy experience in his energy and environmental appointments. It appears he’s also going for diversity. His choices for the top energy and environmental jobs include three women—one black, another one gay and Latina—and a Chinese-American man.

Here is what we know so far:

• Secretary of Energy – Steven Chu, who won the Nobel Prize for physics in 1997, is Obama’s choice to head the U.S. Department of Energy. Chu, 60, is a professor of physics and molecular and cell biology at the University of California, Berkeley. Since 2004, he has served as director of the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, where he has been a leader in promoting research and development of carbon-neutral alternative and renewable energy sources to help reduce global warming.

• EPA Administrator – Lisa Jackson, former commissioner of the New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection and a 16-year veteran enforcement officer at the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, will become the new EPA administrator. Jackson, 46 and a native of New Orleans, holds a master’s degree in chemical engineering from Princeton University. She will be the first black woman ever to lead the EPA.

• Energy Czar – Carol Browner, 52, former EPA administrator under President Bill Clinton, is Obama’s choice to fill a newly created position that will help coordinate energy and environmental policy among more than a dozen federal agencies. As the nation’s so-called “energy czar,” Browner will advise the president and vice president on energy issues and will also lead the National Energy Council if Obama decides to create one. It is not yet clear whether Browner will be an official member of the Cabinet.

• White House Council on Environmental Quality Chair – Nancy Sutley, currently Los Angeles deputy mayor for energy and environment, will head the Council on Environmental Quality in the Obama White House. Her responsibilities will include advising the president and vice president on domestic and international environmental issues and coordinating environmental policies and actions among numerous federal agencies. Before joining Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa in his effort to transform L.A. into “the greenest big city in America,” Sutley was an energy advisor to California Gov. Gray Davis, deputy secretary for policy and intergovernmental relations at the California EPA, and a member of the state Water Resources Control Board. During the 2008 presidential campaign, Sutley, a prominent gay rights activist, served on Sen. Hillary Clinton's California Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender steering committee.

• Secretary of Interior – It is still not clear who Obama intends to choose as Secretary of the Interior.