Barack Obama is expected to call for a five-year freeze on all non-security spending in a further sign that the White House is trimming its agenda to a harsh new political climate.

White House officials told reporters that Obama would call for a freeze on all spending, aside from defence, homeland security and veterans.

The reports were seen as further evidence that Obama is tailoring his environmental agenda following the exit of a senior presidential adviser.

The announcement of the departure of Carol Browner, the senior White House energy and climate change adviser, ahead of the State of the Union address has deepened concerns among environmentalists that Obama is prepared to modify his green agenda to win support from Republicans in Congress and the business community.

Obama would return to a favourite theme of green jobs in the State of the Union, Nancy Sutley, the chair of the White House council on environmental quality, said.

"The president has talked since the beginning of the administration about how important it is to move us to a clean energy economy. He'll talk about it tonight," she told reporters ahead of the speech.

But Obama's call for deep spending cuts will reinforce concerns among some environmentalists that the president is planning a retreat on environmental protection or programmes to encourage cleaner energy use.

There is also a political shift away from Obama's top priority in his first two years in the White House — passing a comprehensive energy and climate change bill.

Sutley indicated that promoting clean energy — not climate change, or putting a price on carbon — would be the priority in the next two years of Obama's presidency.

However, she said the president would still push ahead on the broader environmental agenda he set out in the 2008 elections — despite Browner's resignation.

"It doesn't diminish the commitment of the administration to the issues she was working on," she said.

However, she offered no assurances that the White House would replace Browner, and studiously avoided use of the words climate change.

Browner was arguably the most powerful member of Obama's "green dream team" when he came to Washington two years ago, and she was instrumental in pushing through the lead item on the administration's environmental agenda: the passage of climate change legislation.

But the Senate failed to take up a climate change bill last year — and some environmentalists blamed the White House for its failure to prod Senators into action.

Obama has conceded that the Republican party's gains in the midterm elections have made it impossible to get a climate change bill through Congress.

That left Browner with no clearly defined mission, and news reports said yesterday she had been passed over for more senior White House posts.

In addition, Browner was also damaged by her high-profile role during the BP oil disaster. In August she made the now-notorious claim on behalf of the White House that the "vast majority" of the 4.9m barrels of oil that spewed into the Gulf of Mexico from BP's broken well had "gone". Her statement was later discredited.

But the timing of her departure – on the eve of the state of the union address – has deepened concerns that the environment has slipped down Obama's agenda.

Environmental groups are worried Obama will not move forcefully enough to protect the authority of the EPA to regulate greenhouse gas emissions from Republicans and Democrats who oppose environmental regulations.

In her comments today Sutley said Obama would veto any self-standing bill that sought to block the EPA's authority. But she pointedly did not commit the president to blocking such a measure if it were rolled into a larger bill.

"We will just have to see about that," she said.

It is also unclear what powers will be left to Obama to encourage the transition to a clean energy economy, with Republicans calling for 22% cuts in government spending.

The Republican proposals call for deep cuts to environmental protection schemes and programmes to encourage energy efficiency as well as to funds to the UN's climate body.