The Senate late yesterday unanimously approved legislation that requires the White House to produce a detailed report of how automatic across-the-board budget cuts set to take effect in January would hit federal agencies, including U.S. EPA, the Energy Department and the Interior Department.

The bill is now headed to President Obama's desk after passing the House by a lopsided margin last week (E&ENews PM, Jan. 18). Its passage is the latest in a string of signs that lawmakers are beginning to digest the impact of nine-figure cuts scheduled to begin in January if Congress does not agree on a trillion-dollar long-term deficit reduction plan.

Even as lawmakers home in on this winter's post-election session as the prime time to solve the puzzle of "sequestration," as the automatic cuts are known on Capitol Hill, the option of postponing the day of reckoning until early 2013 remains very much on the table for lawmakers.

A group of conservative senators recently urged House GOP leaders to pass a government funding bill that lasts until spring rather than terminating in the lame-duck session, leaving the door open for a delay in the sequester that lasts the same time period as any continuing resolution (E&E Daily, July 24).