WASHINGTON – U.S. Sen. Olympia Snowe said she is encouraging President Bush to establish an Office of Climate Change within the White House and step up the administration’s response to the issue.

Such actions could address concerns about the 1997 Kyoto Protocol, which would require industrial countries to cut back on greenhouse gas emissions, Snowe said in a news release.

Bush opposes the agreement. Snowe said she is concerned that the United States does not appear to have a high level, noncareer official who can represent and speak for the White House on the issue.

“The bottom line is that we must continue to look for ways to move forward in reducing international greenhouse gas emissions that will be real, that are achievable, and that will be economically viable both for the developing nations and for the industrialized world,” said Snowe, a member of the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation, in a letter to Bush.

Snowe said an office could “coordinate White House climate change policies with the various agencies involved and with the National Energy Policy Development Group, as U.S. climate change policy cannot be developed independently of national energy policies,” she said.