Who runs this
CBAM Defaults is built and run by Johnny Barhouche, a logistics director based in Abu Dhabi who has spent his career in freight and customs. It started in June 2026 as a faster way to read the EU's default-value annex than a 25-page government PDF, and it is maintained by one person with the tools listed below. It is not affiliated with the European Commission, HM Revenue & Customs (HMRC), or any consultancy or software vendor.
Why it exists
An importer or exporter facing CBAM needs three things fast: the official default value for their product and origin, what that value costs at the current certificate price, and a clean way to ask a supplier for actual data. Every other site that offers those things for free does so to book a demo for a five-figure platform. This site offers them as the product.
Where the data comes from and how it is loaded
The values are the official EU CBAM default embedded-emission values from Commission Implementing Regulation (EU) 2025/2621, as amended by Commission Implementing Regulation (EU) 2026/1740. They are loaded by a script from the Official Journal's machine-readable (Formex) package of the regulation, not retyped. The source line on every data page shows the edition in force (Implementing Reg (EU) 2025/2621 (as amended), adopted 31 Jul 2026) and the date the republished values were last reviewed against the source (10 Aug 2026). When the EU replaces the annex, the loader runs again, the source line changes, and an entry is posted in updates.
How a euro figure is computed
Every cost on this site is computed, never typed. Per tonne of product: the default value for the year (the total embedded emissions plus the mark-up the regulation applies), minus the free-allocation deduction (the product's CBAM benchmark multiplied by the CBAM factor for the year: 97.5% in 2026, 95% in 2027, 90% in 2028), multiplied by the official CBAM certificate price. The certificate price is the one the Commission publishes, quarterly in 2026 and weekly from 2027, and is refreshed the day a new one is published. The method is written out in how to calculate your CBAM costs.
What is free and what is paid
Every lookup, both calculators, the UK threshold checker, the guides, the updates and the CSV templates are free and need no sign-up. Two things are paid: the analysis-ready export of the whole dataset, and the UK CBAM readiness pack. You are paying for the format and the join, not for the public data, which stays free on every page. Payments are handled by Creem as merchant of record, and a 14-day refund applies to both.
Corrections
If a value on this site does not match the regulation, email the page link and the row to hello@cbamdefaults.com. Corrections are made against the official text and noted in updates.
Limits
This is an informational republication of official data with a calculator on top. It is not legal, tax or customs advice, and it does not file anything for you. Confirm every figure against the official regulation before it goes into a declaration.