Updated at 11:23 a.m. on Jan. 25.

Democratic leaders' efforts this year to get broad climate and energy legislation passed will largely hinge on whether they can convince moderates in both parties that it would create jobs.

The Senate Environment and Public Works Committee will hold another in a series of hearings this week to try to further that argument. Thursday's hearing stars Interior Secretary Ken Salazar and focuses on jobs that could be created through expanding the use of solar energy.

Democratic leaders have a tough climb toward 60 votes for a bill like the one passed in the committee last year that calls for an economy-wide cap-and-trade program. It is unclear how persuasive Thursday's hearing will be with a panel that -- other than Senate Finance Chairman Max Baucus, D-Mont. -- does not have a strong representation of moderates in either party.

At the same time, Senate Energy and Natural Resources ranking member Lisa Murkowski, R-Alaska, and Senate Agriculture Chairwoman Blanche Lincoln, D-Ark., are leading an effort to try to pass a resolution blocking EPA from regulating greenhouse gases. There is some fear this effort could undermine the attempt to pass broad climate legislation by this spring, as both Murkowski and Lincoln have cautioned that that timeline may be too quick to do a bill that has a deep impact on the economy.

Senate Foreign Relations Chairman John Kerry, D-Mass., and Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., are scheduled to deliver remarks at a discussion hosted by several advocacy groups Wednesday in the Capitol. Kerry and Graham, along with Sen. Joe Lieberman, I/D-Conn., are working together to forge a bipartisan climate bill. Other speakers include energy experts in the national security and agriculture arenas. The discussion's sponsors include Operation Free, Blue Green Alliance, National Farmers Union and We Can Lead.

In addition to the EPW hearing on solar energy, the House Science and Technology Committee will hold a hearing Wednesday on the Energy Department's Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energy program (ARPA-E). At a Senate hearing last week, Secretary Steven Chu described it as a "highly entrepreneurial funding model to explore potentially transformative technologies that are too risky for industry to fund." The program's director, Arun Majumdar, is set to testify.

Top executives of the nation's auto companies are also descending on the Capitol this week for the 2010 Washington Auto Show. CEOs of several electric-vehicle companies and organizations are hosting a Green Car Summit this afternoon in the Cannon Office Building. And on Tuesday at the Convention Center, EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson, and Reps. John Dingell, D-Mich., Fred Upton, R-Mich., and Steny Hoyer, D-Md., are slated to speak.

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