Capps

WASHINGTON — She took a canoe ride through the Amazon and swam with dolphins.

But U.S. Rep. Lois Capps, D-Santa Barbara, said Wednesday one of the things that struck her most on her recent fact-finding trip to Brazil was how climate change and global warming are indeed global issues.

"We (in the United States) see it in the prism of trying to increase our fuel standards and reduce our carbon emissions in this country," the Santa Barbara Democrat said.

But, "when it comes to global climate change, we are not solitary countries. We are part of a fragile ecosystem in the world, and all of us need to be on the same page in trying to resolve it."

Capps spent six days in Brazil last week as part of a bipartisan congressional delegation headed by U.S. Rep. Edward Markey, a Massachusetts Democrat who chairs the House Select Committee on Energy Independence and Global Warming. Capps was chosen for the trip because she sits on the House Energy and Commerce Committee.

The delegation — two Democrats and four Republicans — represented the United States at an international forum on climate change in Brasilia, the nation's capital.

The group toured the Amazon to study the effect climate change is having on Brazilian ecosystems and the role deforestation is playing in the warming of the Earth.

"It was amazing to be in the Amazon and to experience it, to be gliding in a canoe through the waterways and have trees hanging over and to see what the jungle look is and to realize the significance it has on our planet," Capps said. "Many people call it the lungs of the planet."

The lawmakers also met with researchers who are using sugar cane grown in Brazil to create ethanol.

"I was standing there taking the tour of this research facility, and I thought of all of the research and advances in renewable energy technology that are happening right on the central coast of California, right in Ventura County," Capps said.

At the two-day forum on climate change, Capps and other members of the congressional delegation joined lawmakers from other nations to try to come up with ways to address global warming.

The conference was organized by Global Legislators Organized for a Balanced Environment and included representatives from the eight leading industrial countries as well as developing nations, such as Brazil, India, China and Mexico.

"It was a very rewarding experience for me to see that real leadership and expertise is developing around the world by people who frankly consume a lot less than we do," Capps said. "They take seriously what is happening to our planet, and they want to do something about it.''

Brazil and the United States need to work as partners to tackle some of the issues involving energy and global warming, Capps said.

"We have the same kind of energy challenges," she said. "They are rich in resources like we are, and they are looking to us for leadership."