(This is an archived page, from the Patterns of Power Edition 3 book. Current versions are at book contents).
Regulations are needed to prevent businesses from damaging the local environment: with polluting chemicals, by endangering wildlife habitats, by encroaching on protected countryside, or by adversely affecting residential neighbourhoods for example. This is part of the mission of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), for example.
Regulations can be implemented by having some form of licensing for setting up a business, to allow checks to be made on its environmental impact, followed by periodic policing to ensure compliance. Regulations might be national (Federal) or localised at different levels of subsidiarity.
Global talks on climate change, culminating in the Paris Accord (6.7.5), have resulted in a system of national targets for carbon emissions. Additional economic regulations will be needed to achieve these targets.