Environmental taxation is booming in the European Union (EU) as citizens' awareness of the need to stop the current climate emergency increases.
According to the statistical office of the EU (Eurostat), in 2018 environmental tax revenue in the 27 member states totaled 324.6 billion euros. This amount was a 3% increase in nominal terms from the previous year, but 49% higher than in 2002.
Energy taxes accounted for the largest share (77.7%) of the EU’s 2018 environmental tax revenue, followed by transport taxes (19.1%), and pollution and resource taxes (3.3%).
The contribution from environmental taxes to total government revenue from taxes and social contributions varied significantly across EU Member States in 2018, with the highest shares recorded in Latvia (10.9%), Bulgaria (9.8%), Greece (9.5%), Slovenia (9.4%) and Croatia (9.3%).
At the other end of the scale, the smallest shares were observed in Luxembourg, (4.4%), Germany (4.5%) and Sweden (4.8%).
According to Eurostat's figures, in Finland the share was 6.92% of the government's total revenue from taxes. This was slightly higher than in the previous year (6.9%), but surprisingly lower than in 2016, when the share of revenue from environmental taxes was 7.05%
