President-elect Barack Obama's pick for energy secretary, Dr. Steven Chu, is a Nobel Prize-winning scientist who's on the record calling coal a "nightmare" and advocating raising U.S. gas taxes to European levels to promote conservation. (Here's video of the speech; the "nightmare" quote comes 28 minutes in.)

Mr. Obama himself has so far dismissed the idea of raising gas taxes, and worked hard during his campaign to reassure the utility and coal industries that he didn't plan radical steps to slash the use of coal in power generation.

This apparent difference of opinion between Mr. Obama and his likely nominee is just one of the many red flags waving as Washington gears up for the most ambitious effort to remake America's energy policy since Jimmy Carter slipped on a cardigan.

If you think Washington's debate over whether to bail out General Motors Corp. and Chrysler LLC is acrimonious, wait until the debates over energy and climate change policy start. The auto bailout debate has become a proxy for the coming clashes over energy strategy. Some green-conscious Democrats argued that Detroit's car makers should be compelled to use federal subsidies to accelerate improvements in mileage. Others from both parties questioned how companies that have mostly lost money on small cars and hybrids will suddenly find ways to make them profitable. With the collapse of the proposal last week, the specifics may be moot. But the underlying argument about Washington's role in guiding industry's behavior on energy issues is just getting started.

There are areas of American economic life that aren't affected by energy costs. It's just hard to think of many. Detroit's woes are directly linked to energy costs. When oil prices go up, Detroit goes down.