The Times has caught wind of some of the details of the bill, drafted by Energy and Commerce Committee Chairman Henry Waxman (D-Calif.) and Energy and Environment Subcommittee Chairman Edward Markey (D-Mass.). The legislation encompasses cap-and-trade, a national renewable electricity standard, a renewable energy standard and a low-carbon fuel standard.

On cap-and-trade, the bill sets the same goal as President Obama’s budget proposal for carbon emissions reduction by 2050: an 83 percent decrease. But the target for 2020 is more ambitious, aiming for a 20 percent cut from 2005 levels, compared with Obama’s 14 percent. Markey and Waxman also want a 42 percent reduction by 2030; Obama did not set a target for that year.

The renewable energy measure will call for utilities to get 25 percent of their energy from renewable sources, such as wind and solar, by 2025, and up to one-fifth of this quota can be met with energy efficiency improvements. The bill will also require power utilities to improve their efficiency by 15 percent by 2020; for gas distributors, the requirement will be ten percent. Additionally, the legislation calls for a higher proportion of biofuels in the country’s fuel mix.

Overall, the bill sets broader and more stringent goals than Obama’s proposal, though the differences are relatively minor. Waxman and Markey’s legislation is also slightly more ambitious than a proposal outlined by the United States Climate Action Partnership, a coalition of environmental and business groups. The USCAP proposal called for a 14 to 20 percent emissions reduction by 2020 and an 80 percent reduction by 2050, among other targets.

Waxman and Markey hope to vote the bill out of committee by June. Because it will still face debate in the Energy and Commerce Committee and eventually in conference with the Senate leadership, however, it is certain to undergo major changes — and no one really expects it to emerge in anything resembling its current, highly ambitious form.

Update: And right on cue, the bill appears on the Energy and Commerce website. Here are the full text of the draft bill (648 pages) and the much more digestible summary.

During a news conference at the Obama-Biden transition office in Washington, Obama named Nancy Killefer, a former Treasury official in the Clinton administration, to fill the new post of chief performance officer.

From Obama’s prepared remarks:

For nearly thirty years – as a leader at McKinsey & Company, and as Assistant Secretary for Management, Chief Financial Officer, and Chief Operating Officer at Treasury under President Clinton — Nancy has built a career out of making major American corporations and public institutions more efficient, effective and transparent.

Nancy is an expert in streamlining processes and wringing out inefficiencies so that taxpayers and consumers get more for their money. And during her time at Treasury, she helped bring the Department into the twenty-first century, modernizing the IRS and preparing systems for Y2K.

But Nancy also understands that at the end of the day, government services are delivered by people. That’s why she’s always worked tirelessly to empower employees to take matters into their own hands: to rethink outmoded ways of doing things, to embrace new systems and technologies, and to take initiative in developing better practices.

When Nancy was offered her first position at Treasury, she responded, “If you’re willing to embrace significant change, then you’re looking at the right person. But if you just want to keep the trains running on time, don’t ask me to do this job.”

When I heard that, I knew I’d chosen exactly the right person for the challenges we face.

The Associated Press points out the first-glance irony inherent in today’s announcement.

Yet, even as [Obama] announced the post that’s also aimed at spending taxpayer money more efficiently, Obama was spending his first week in Washington promoting his mammoth economic stimulus plan that could total as much as $775 billion over two years — much of the new spending aimed at creating jobs and stoking the troubled economy.

But, I guess if the plan is to blow money like its going out of style to get the economy moving again, bringing on a specialist to maximize government efficiency probably isn’t the worst idea in the world.