Mr Obama will hold a news conference at 1700 EST (6am Singapore time) on Monday to talk about 'the nation's energy and environmental future', his transition office said on Sunday.

At the news conference Mr Obama is expected to name Nobel physics laureate Steven Chu as his energy secretary and former Environmental Protection Agency chief Carol Browner as the head of a new council that will coordinate White House policy on energy, climate and environment, Democratic sources have said.

Mr Obama is also expected to announce he has chosen Ms Lisa Jackson, the chief of staff for New Jersey's governor, to run the EPA and Ms Nancy Sutley, a deputy mayor of Los Angeles, as head of the White House Council on Environmental Quality.

He is also likely to face questions about Rod Blagojevich, governor of his home state of Illinois and a fellow Democrat, who was arrested last week on charges of conspiracy to swap political favours for cash, including an attempt to sell the US Senate seat being vacated by Mr Obama last month.

Mr Obama has said energy and environmental matters would be important to his administration, and he wants to spend billions of dollars to promote alternative energy sources and create millions of green energy jobs.

News of who would make up Mr Obama's energy and environment team began trickling out last week and the choices were applauded by environment groups.

The team will be charged with developing policies to reduce carbon emissions blamed for global warming. They will also work on developing new sources of energy and creating new jobs.

Ms Browner, a principal at global strategy firm The Albright Group LLC, had a long history at the EPA.

Dr Chu, who would be the first Asian-American to lead the energy department, would work closely with MS Browner who will be responsible for coordinating energy, environment and climate policy for the White House.

Dr Chu shared the 1997 Nobel Prize in physics for developing methods to cool and trap atoms with laser light. He has been director of the Energy Department's Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory in California since 1994.

Ms Jackson was New Jersey's environmental protection commissioner until she became the governor's chief of staff this month.

In a meeting last week with former Vice-President Al Gore, Mr Obama said attacking global climate change was a 'matter of urgency' that would create jobs.

Mr Obama hopes addressing climate change can create the kind of jobs that will help pull the US economy out of a deepening recession. He has begun to lay out plans for a massive recovery plan to help stimulate the economy and create about 2.5 million jobs - a portion of them so-called 'green jobs'. -- REUTERS