Washington Gov. Jay Inslee speaks Dec. 8 in Paris during a panel discussion at the United Nations' conference on climate change. Inslee said West Coast states were leading ‘the charge' on climate change.

Washington Gov. Jay Inslee this week pursued climate-change agreements with France, Chile and Canada, but said Tuesday that he has no plans to involve state lawmakers.

Inslee spoke with reporters by telephone from Paris, where was attending the United Nations climate change conference.

While not part of the main negotiations, Inslee has been meeting with leaders of states and provinces from other countries.

He was on a panel Monday that included California Gov. Jerry Brown and talked about what West Coast states are doing.

“We’re rocking on this issue. We’re leading the charge. We’re going to show the rest of the country and world,” Inslee said.

The governor has made global warming a focus of his administration, an agenda that has put him at odds with the Washington Farm Bureau, which warns carbon-cutting mandates will hurt producers by raising the cost of fuel, electricity, fertilizer and food processing.

Inslee has been unable to get carbon-reduction bills through the Legislature, but he has acted administratively.

Inslee pledged Monday that Washington state will cooperate with France and Chile on responses to climate change.

The agreements with are non-binding. The pledge with France includes promises to exchange information about managing water supplies to protect agriculture.

Inslee said he has been discussing with Canadian officials involving the state in carbon cap-and-trade programs run by provinces.

He also announced while in Paris that he will order state agencies to buy more electric vehicles.

Asked whether he had any climate-change measures to introduce to the Legislature, he said he did not.

“At this moment, I can’t think of anything,” Inslee said.

Rather than the upcoming 2016 legislative, Inslee said his focus was on a carbon-cap rule he has ordered the state Department of Ecology to write.

The rule would require Washington’s manufacturing and transportation sectors to cap and rollback greenhouse gas emissions.

If the state combined its carbon cap with those in several Canadian provinces, Washington companies would have more flexibility in meeting overall reduction goals, Inslee said. “It looks like that kind of system makes sense to us,” he said.

Inslee dismissed as “not serious” a dig by Sen. Doug Ericksen, R-Ferndale, who has told reporters the governor should have appeared in Paris via the Skype online conference system and saved jetliner emissions. Ericksen, the chairman of the Senate Energy, Environment and Telecommunications Committee, is a critic of Inslee’s climate-change policies.

The Farm Bureau says a carbon cap would leave farmers with less money to invest in new technologies that would cut carbon emissions without hurting their bottom line.

Inslee left for Paris Dec. 4 and planned to return Dec. 9. His trip was paid for by the Georgetown (University) Climate Center.