If Congress doesn’t get ya on greenhouse gas emissions, the Environmental Protection Agency will.

The problem facing factories, power plants and eventually small businesses is that if Congress fails to adopt some sort of climate change bill, EPA will regulate GHG emissions, starting with carbon dioxide.

Key point: The Obama administration is willing to limit EPA’s authority to regulate GHGs in exchange for creating a national cap-and-trade emission system that reduces climate changing pollutant releases.

But this limit on EPA is contingent on getting a cap-and-trade program adopted — this year — and before the 2010 election season kicks in.

Senator Lindsey Graham (R-SC) has been working with Sens. John Kerry (D-MA) and Joe Lieberman (I-CT) to write a Senate bill that would replace EPA regulations with a limited cap-and-trade program. The tri-partisan bill would also promote offshore oil and natural gas exploration and new nuclear power plant constructions. Details were supposed to have been revealed April 26.

The widely expected new Senate proposal was so expected that EPA chief Lisa Jackson was booked on The Daily Show with Jon Stewart to discuss the new approach.

However, the sudden spike in interest to revive the immigration debate might have killed momentum for the Graham/Kerry/Lieberman plan.

Graham was so annoyed that the Obama administration is giving immigration a higher priority than climate change legislation, that he pulled out of the cap-and-trade negotiation. That left Jackson and Stewart with nothing to discuss.

However, Jackson did reiterate that the administration’s key goal is to establish a price on carbon.