WASHINGTON, Dec. 10 (UPI) -- Steven Chu will serve as U.S. energy secretary and Carol Browner as "energy czar" in the Obama administration, Democratic officials said Wednesday.
The Wall Street Journal reported unnamed Democratic officials as saying President-elect Barack Obama will nominate Chu, a Nobel laureate and director of the Energy Department's Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, to be the department's secretary. Chu will be tasked with implementing the incoming administration's efforts to lessen the United States' reliance on foreign oil through development of renewable energy sources, the newspaper said.
Browner, who will coordinate energy policy in the White House, had worked in the Environmental Protection Agency in the Clinton administration.
The Journal also reported Democrats close to the situation said Nancy Sutley, deputy mayor of Los Angeles, will become chairwoman of Obama's Council on Environmental Quality and Lisa Jackson, chief of staff to New Jersey Gov. Jon Corzine, will head the Environmental Protection Agency.
Jackson previously served as commissioner of the New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection.
