WASHINGTON — President Barack Obama is all about change, but on Monday, he went where lots of presidents have gone before: promising that the United States will become energy independent.

"It will be the policy of my administration to reverse our dependence on foreign oil," the new president declared at the White House. This time, the effort is for real, Obama said. "For the sake of our security, our economy and our planet, we must have the courage and commitment to change."

And so Obama opened an ambitious, double-barreled assault on global warming and U.S. energy woes, moving quickly toward rules requiring cleaner-running cars that guzzle less gas. He called it a journey toward energy independence and said "each step begins to move us in a new direction."

Starting his second week in office, Obama took a major step toward allowing California and other states to target greenhouse gases through more stringent auto-emission standards, and he ordered new federal rules directing automakers to start making more fuel-efficient cars as required by law.

The auto industry responded warily. Reducing planet-warming emissions is a great idea, carmakers and dealers said, but they expressed deep concern about costly regulations and conflicting state and federal rules at a time when people already are not buying cars. U.S. auto sales plunged 18 percent in 2008.

And industry analysts said the changes could cost consumers thousands of dollars — for smaller, "greener" cars.

Obama directed the Environmental Protection Agency to review whether California and more than a dozen states should be allowed to impose tougher auto emission standards on carmakers to fight greenhouse gas emissions. The Bush administration had blocked the efforts by the states, which account for about half of the nation's auto sales.

The new president also said his administration would issue new fuel-efficiency requirements to cover 2011 model vehicles.

Obama acknowledged the worries of automakers but said urgent action was needed nonetheless.

"Our goal is not to further burden an already struggling industry. It is to help America's automakers prepare for the future," he said.

U.S. imports of foreign oil have continued to climb, Obama said, even as previous presidents pledged to reverse the trend. No more, he said.

"I want to be clear from the beginning of this administration that we have made our choice: America will not be held hostage to dwindling resources, hostile regimes and a warming planet," he said in the ornate East Room of the White House, where an audience of environmentalists cheered him on.

Underscoring environmental worries, a new report said many damaging effects of climate change are already all but irreversible, sure to last until the year 3000 and beyond. "It's not like air pollution where if we turn off a smokestack, in a few days the air is clear," said Susan Solomon, chief author of the international report and a climate researcher with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's Earth System Research Laboratory in Boulder, Colo.

Showing the early limits of bipartisanship, House Republican leader John Boehner said Obama's reopening of a key California ruling was dangerous. "The effect of this policy will be to destroy American jobs at the very time government leaders should be working together to protect and create them," he said.

Obama's order for an EPA review of California's case could shake up the auto industry — 13 other states and the District of Columbia have adopted California's standards, and others are considering them. If California gets a federal waiver to enact tougher emissions standards, the other states could then sign on.

Also, Obama directed federal transportation officials to get going on new fuel efficiency rules, which will affect cars produced and sold for the 2011 model year. That step was needed to enforce a 2007 energy law, which calls for cars and trucks to be more efficient every year, to at least 35 miles per gallon by 2020.

Obama also meant to set a tone with his promises: Science will trump ideology and special interests, attention will stay high even when gas prices fall.

It was a none-too-subtle admonishing of previous administrations, chiefly George W. Bush's.

"It falls on us to choose whether to risk the peril that comes with our current course or to seize the promise of energy independence," Obama said. "And for the sake of our security, our economy and our planet, we must have the courage and the commitment to change."

Obama put that peril he mentioned in stark terms. He said dependence on foreign oil "bankrolls dictators, pays for nuclear proliferation and funds both sides of our struggle against terrorism. It puts the American people at the mercy of shifting gas prices, stifles innovation and sets back our ability to compete."




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