In the last few years, Earth's atmosphere has not only gotten warmer but gotten warmer faster. Reducing the risk of drastic climate change will require radical cutbacks in fossil fuel use, especially in rich countries, which use more than their fair share. That in turn requires major changes in how cities are arranged, how we move about, and how we make everything from bottles to buildings-nothing less than an "eco-industrial revolution."

Governments must force this revolution but cannot plan it in detail because of its vast complexity. Competitive markets, in contrast, excel at driving economic revolutions. Properly harnessed, the market can power the next industrial revolution, toward ecological sustainability. How? Governments must tax pollution, in order to signal its true costs. Once they do, businesses will profit by polluting less and developing clean technologies, and consumers will save by buying greener products-or buying less. This is why green taxation is the most promising solution to the one of the greatest problems of our era.

		The emissions subject to taxation tend to decrease.