Washington » President Barack Obama on Sunday praised the energy bill passed by the House late last week as an "extraordinary first step," but he spoke out against a provision that would impose trade penalties on countries that do not accept limits on global warming pollution.

"At a time when the economy worldwide is still deep in recession and we've seen a significant drop in global trade, I think we have to be very careful about sending any protectionist signals out there," Obama said.

He added, "I think there may be other ways of doing it than with a tariff approach." The passage of the House bill was an important, if tentative, victory for the new president, becoming the first time either chamber of Congress had approved a mandatory ceiling on the gases linked to global warming.

Obama, hoping to build momentum in the Senate after the House narrowly passed the legislation Friday night, delayed the start of a Sunday golf game to speak to a small group of reporters in the Oval Office.

He acknowledged that the initial targets for reducing greenhouse gas emissions set by the House bill were quite modest and would probably not satisfy the governments of other countries or many environmental groups. But he said he hoped to build on those early targets in fashioning a more robust program in the future as part of his administration's efforts to move the nation from an economy based on fossil fuels

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toward one built on renewable sources of energy.