EU CBAM Default Values: What They Are, When You Must Use Them, and How to Find Yours (2026)

If an EU customer has asked you for CBAM data, or your freight forwarder has mentioned default values, this is the page that explains what they are talking about, in plain terms, with the actual numbers a click away.

CBAM default values are the EU's published emission figures for imported goods. An importer can calculate the carbon cost from a default value or from the producing installation's verified emissions. The defaults are official, country-specific, and product-specific, and they carry a mark-up on top of the country average. Knowing which of the two inputs gives the lower number for your goods is the difference between quoting an EU buyer a competitive price and quietly losing the order to a supplier who did the homework.

What a CBAM default value actually is

The Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism puts a carbon price on goods imported into the EU in five covered sectors: iron and steel, aluminium, cement, fertilisers, and hydrogen (electricity is handled separately). The price tracks the EU Emissions Trading System, so a tonne of embedded CO2 in imported steel costs roughly what a tonne costs an EU producer.

To charge that, the EU needs to know how much carbon is embedded in each shipment. There are two ways to answer: the producing installation's verified actual emissions, or a default value: a single number, in tonnes of CO2 equivalent per tonne of product, for a given good from a given country.

These values live in Commission Implementing Regulation (EU) 2025/2621 of 16 December 2025, whose Annex I was replaced by the correcting Implementing Regulation (EU) 2026/1740 of 20 July 2026. They replace the rougher global-average figures used during the transitional period, and they are now broken out by:

• Direct emissions from the production process itself (fuel combustion, chemical reactions, on-site heat).
• Indirect emissions from the electricity the production consumes.
• Total embedded emissions, the sum of the two, which is the headline number on each of our pages.

You can browse all of them, by country and by sector, on the CBAM default values database.

When you use a default value (and when actual data is worth it)

This is the part most explainers blur, and the rule changed in October 2025:

Actual emissions and default values are alternatives. Regulation (EU) 2025/2083 of 8 October 2025 rewrote Article 7(2) of the CBAM Regulation (EU) 2023/956: embedded emissions are determined based on actual emissions, or by reference to default values. Actual emissions have to be verified by an accredited verifier (Article 8).

Actual data is not automatically cheaper. A plant whose verified figure is below its country's default, mark-up included, comes in under it; a plant above it comes in higher. The free-allocation deduction can move too: under Implementing Regulation (EU) 2025/2620, with a default value the CBAM benchmark follows the production route the default table lists for that country, and with actual data it follows the route the installation actually runs.

A few practical consequences:

• If your country is not listed for a CN code, the importer uses the Other countries and territories figure. You can see that row in our data wherever it applies.
• If your country is listed but a particular CN code has no specific value, the other countries figure still applies for that code.
• Default values apply to the goods in scope; electricity has its own treatment and is not covered by the product tables here.

The reason to care: a default carries a mark-up on top of the country average, so for a plant below that level it means the EU importer pays more than its real emissions justify. More on that below, and in full in the guide on how to calculate your CBAM costs.

Why default values carry a mark-up

Default values are conservative on purpose. Under Annex IV of the CBAM Regulation, each is the exporting country's average emission intensity for that good, or, where reliable data for the country cannot be applied, the average of the ten exporting countries with the highest emission intensities. A mark-up then goes on top. Implementing Regulation (EU) 2025/2621 gives the reason: to account for installations that emit more than their country's average.

The mark-up rises over time. Annex I, as corrected by 2026/1740, sets it at 10% for 2026, 20% for 2027, and 30% from 2028 for cement, iron and steel, aluminium and hydrogen. Fertilisers carry 1% from 2026 onward. On top of the markup, the certificate obligation itself phases in over the definitive period as EU ETS free allocation is withdrawn, so the share of embedded emissions you pay for grows year on year.

The Commission updates these mechanics, so treat the percentages here as orientation and confirm the current figures against the regulation. Our exposure calculator applies the live values so you do not have to track them by hand.

The takeaway: a default describes a country, a verified figure describes one installation. Plants below the marked-up country average can beat the default; plants above it cannot.

How to find the default value for your product

You need two things: your country and your CN code (the EU customs classification for your product, usually eight digits, sometimes shown shorter at the heading level).

Three ways to get to the number on this site:

1. Search. Use the search box (or press the command-key shortcut) and type a CN code, a product name, or a country. It jumps straight to the value.
2. Browse by country. Open your country, for example China, India, or Türkiye, then pick a sector to see every product with its direct, indirect, and total values.
3. Browse by sector. Open a sector, for example iron and steel, aluminium, cement, fertilisers, or hydrogen, to compare the same product across exporting countries.

Each value carries a visible source line citing Implementing Reg (EU) 2025/2621 and the official EU file, so you can trust the number and show your buyer where it comes from.

A worked example: grey Portland cement sits around 1.49 tCO2e per tonne at the high end of the country range, while flat-rolled steel and the most carbon-intensive steel grades run far higher. See the specific figures on the grey Portland cement page and the flat-rolled steel page, or the country-and-sector view for China steel.

What the number costs you

A default value is only half the story. What an EU buyer actually pays is the certificate cost, which in essence is:

embedded emissions (the default value times your tonnes), minus the benchmark-based free-allocation deduction from Reg (EU) 2025/2620, multiplied by the EU ETS certificate price, minus any carbon price already paid in the country of origin.

Because the ETS price moves weekly and the free-allocation deduction shrinks each year, the practical way to see your exposure is to run it. The exposure calculatortakes your product, country, volume, and year, and returns the embedded emissions and the estimated certificate cost from the default value, the number to compare your supplier's verified figure against. The full method is in how to calculate your CBAM costs.

How to pay less than the default

If your plant's real emissions are below the default, mark-up included, the move is to report verified actual data instead of accepting the default. That means collecting installation-level emissions from the producer and getting them into a form the EU importer can use.

Two free templates make that concrete: a supplier emissions questionnaire and a buyer data-request sheet, both on the templates page. They are the fastest way to start turning a high default into a lower, verified number.

For a sector that feels this acutely, see CBAM for steel importers, where default values are among the highest.

Key dates

• 1 January 2026: the CBAM definitive period began. Embedded emissions from imports now carry a real financial obligation.
• 2026 onward: importers report emissions for the year, from verified actual emissions or from default values.
• 2027: CBAM certificates become available to buy, and the first surrender for 2026 emissions is due by 30 September 2027.

A 50-tonne annual threshold per importer was introduced as a 2026 simplification, exempting the smallest importers. If your EU buyer is above it (most industrial buyers are), default values are firmly in play.