The White House Office of Energy and Climate Change Policy is a new government entity in the United States created by President Barack Obama. Its first director is Carol Browner,[1] who was Administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency for the eight years of the Bill Clinton administration. The office was created in order to coordinate administration policy on energy and climate change.
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President Obama launched the Major Economies Forum on Energy and Climate Change, to facilitate candid dialogue among key developed and developing countries regarding efforts to advance clean energy and reduce greenhouse gas emissions. For the new forum, President Obama invited the leaders of 16 major economies and the Secretary General of the United Nations to designate representatives to participate in a preparatory session at the U.S. Department of State that occurred on April 27-28 in Washington, D.C. This and other preparatory sessions culminated in a Major Economies Forum Leaders' meeting, which Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi agreed to host in La Maddalena, Italy, in July 2009. [2] The 17-nation MEF meeting was subsequently moved to earthquake-wrecked L'Aquila, Italy, and occurred July 9, 2009.[3]
In April 2011 it was reported that Congress would no longer fund the office in the 2011 budget.[4]