CostOak

What is CBAM? What EU importers really pay

By Jai Nischal Verma · Prices checked 31 Oct 2026 · EU law guide

What is CBAM: a port worker checks costs beside steel coils. Certificate prices, the phase-in, 50 tonnes and 30 September.

Law last checked: 31 October 2026. Figures below are copied from the EU texts linked in Sources. This is general information, not legal, tax or customs advice. Rules and prices change; confirm them before you import.

Picture a shipment of steel arriving at Rotterdam on a Tuesday in 2026. The mill already paid whatever carbon rules apply at home. The EU now adds its own line. That line is a CBAM certificate, priced off the EU carbon market, and in 2026 it covers only a sliver of the emissions in the metal.

The definitive regime started on 1 January 2026[1][3]. If you import more than 50 tonnes of CBAM goods in a calendar year, you need to be an authorised CBAM declarant. Hydrogen and electricity never get that 50-tonne pass[1][3]. Certificates themselves go on sale on 1 February 2027, and the first surrender date is 30 September 2027[3].

What this costs you

Take 100 tonnes of goods with 1.8 tonnes of CO2e embedded in each tonne. That 1.8 is an example you replace, not a figure the Commission published. At the Q3 2026 certificate price of €82.32[2], and with the 2026 CBAM factor of 97.5%[4], the simplified bill is:

100 × 1.8 × €82.32 × 2.5% = €370.44.

Same shipment at the Q1 price of €75.36 is €339.12. The quarter your goods cross the border picks the price. Run your own numbers in the certificate cost calculator.

Two honest limits on that sum. The legal free-allocation adjustment is not a flat percentage of your emissions. Implementing Regulation 2025/2620 multiplies a product benchmark by the CBAM factor and by a cross-sectoral correction factor[6]. We have not copied those benchmarks into the calculator, because they differ by product. And for electricity the adjustment is zero, so the phase-in below does not cut the bill[6].

CBAM phase-in, 2026 to 2034: share of embedded emissions paid under a flat (1 − CBAM factor) reading. 2026 2.5% paid, free-allocation factor 97.5%; 2027 5% paid, free-allocation factor 95%; 2028 10% paid, free-allocation factor 90%; 2029 22.5% paid, free-allocation factor 77.5%; 2030 48.5% paid, free-allocation factor 51.5%; 2031 61% paid, free-allocation factor 39%; 2032 73.5% paid, free-allocation factor 26.5%; 2033 86% paid, free-allocation factor 14%; 2034 100% paid, free-allocation factor 0%Share of emissions you pay, simplified phase-in2.5%20265%202710%202822.5%202948.5%203061%203173.5%203286%2033100%2034Green = share paid that year. Pale bar above it = CBAM free-allocation factor still left.PaidFree-allocation factor
CBAM phase-in, 2026 to 2034: share of embedded emissions paid under a flat (1 − CBAM factor) reading
CBAM factor and the simplified share you pay
YearCBAM factor (free allocation)Simplified share paidWhere it comes from
202697.5%2.5%Directive 2003/87/EC Art. 10a(1a)
202795%5%Directive 2003/87/EC Art. 10a(1a)
202890%10%Directive 2003/87/EC Art. 10a(1a)
202977.5%22.5%Directive 2003/87/EC Art. 10a(1a)
203051.5%48.5%Directive 2003/87/EC Art. 10a(1a)
203139%61%Directive 2003/87/EC Art. 10a(1a)
203226.5%73.5%Directive 2003/87/EC Art. 10a(1a)
203314%86%Directive 2003/87/EC Art. 10a(1a)
20340%100%Directive: no CBAM factor from 2034; Commission guidance lists 0%
Factors checked against Directive 2003/87/EC Article 10a(1a) and Commission Guidance No. 4, 31 Oct 2026. How we got these numbers.

What is covered

Annex I of the CBAM Regulation lists six groups: iron and steel, aluminium, cement, fertilisers, hydrogen and electricity[3][1]. Iron, steel, aluminium, hydrogen and electricity count direct emissions only. Cement and fertilisers can also count indirect emissions from electricity used to make them[3].

Sources

Every dated figure on this page is taken from the EU texts below. Where a shipment example uses 100 tonnes and 1.8 tCO2e per tonne, that pair is an illustration, not a published default. Law last checked 31 October 2026. See our methodology and editorial policy. General information, not legal, tax or customs advice.

  1. [1] European Commission: CBAM definitive regime (from 1 January 2026): https://taxation-customs.ec.europa.eu/carbon-border-adjustment-mechanism/cbam-definitive-regime_en (checked 31 Oct 2026)
  2. [2] European Commission: Price of CBAM certificates (quarterly table): https://taxation-customs.ec.europa.eu/carbon-border-adjustment-mechanism/price-cbam-certificates_en (checked 31 Oct 2026)
  3. [3] Regulation (EU) 2023/956, consolidated 20 October 2025 (CBAM Regulation): https://eur-lex.europa.eu/eli/reg/2023/956/2025-10-20/eng (checked 31 Oct 2026)
  4. [4] Directive 2003/87/EC, consolidated (EU ETS), Article 10a(1a) CBAM factor: https://eur-lex.europa.eu/eli/dir/2003/87 (checked 31 Oct 2026)
  5. [5] Commission Implementing Regulation (EU) 2025/2548 (certificate price method): https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/HTML/?uri=CELEX%3A32025R2548 (checked 31 Oct 2026)
  6. [6] Commission Implementing Regulation (EU) 2025/2620 (free-allocation adjustment): https://eur-lex.europa.eu/eli/reg_impl/2025/2620/oj/eng (checked 31 Oct 2026)
  7. [7] European Commission Guidance No. 4 on the free-allocation adjustment (CBAM factor table, including 2034 at 0%): https://taxation-customs.ec.europa.eu/document/download/3aa2c730-4f1b-4524-8f71-d9cfe4880ac7_en?filename=Guidance+No.+4+-+CBAM+calculation+of+the+free+allocation+adjustment+to+the+number+of+CBAM+certificates+to+be+surrendered.pdf (checked 31 Oct 2026)