Twenty environmental groups presented a unified front today on the emerging Senate climate and energy bill a day after meeting with one of the principal authors.

The Alliance for Climate Protection, Sierra Club and Natural Resources Defense Council and other activist groups issued a statement saying they are "encouraged by the progress" made in recent weeks by Sens. John Kerry (D-Mass.), Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) and Joe Lieberman (I-Conn.) as they craft legislation that curbs greenhouse gas emissions and expands domestic oil, gas and nuclear power production.

States took their places in the trenches this week as they joined the court fight either for or against U.S. EPA's "endangerment" finding for greenhouse gases.

Sixteen states asked a federal appeals court this week to become parties in what has grown to be a major legal fight pitting EPA, states and environmental groups against industries, global warming skeptics and other state challengers.

It's official: Petroleum refiner Valero Energy Corp. is the primary financier of a campaign to suspend California's climate change law.

In documents filed with the California Secretary of State yesterday, the California Jobs Initiative confirmed that San Antonio, Texas-based Valero has contributed $500,000 to a budding drive that wants to ask voters in November whether they support delaying the law.

Some Democratic senators and state and local air regulators are concerned that the latest draft of a Senate climate and energy bill would unduly strip authority from U.S. EPA and states. Details emerged earlier this week that draft legislation from Sens. John Kerry (D-Mass.), Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) and Joe Lieberman (I-Conn.) would curb EPA's authority to regulate greenhouse gases under the Clean Air Act and would limit states' climate laws and regulations. But that decision is not sitting well with some Democrats.

Coastal states that agree to oil and gas drilling off their shores would be offered one-quarter of the revenue, under the latest draft of the new climate and energy bill, sources on and off the Hill say. Another 10 percent would go to the Land and Water Conservation Fund, with the remaining 65 percent going to the Treasury for deficit reduction, under the draft authored by Sens. John Kerry (D-Mass.), Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) and Joe Lieberman (I-Conn.), according to a Senate aide close to the process and people who have seen the draft.