The EU CBAM left its transitional, reporting-only phase on 1 January 2026. In the definitive period the old transitional defaults — broad sector averages — were replaced by country- and product-specific values under Commission Implementing Regulation (EU) 2025/2621. Those are the numbers on every country and product page here.
The values rise every year, on purpose
A markup is added to the default emission figures and grows across the phase-in:
- +10% in 2026
- +20% in 2027
- +30% from 2028 onward
The per-year columns (2026, 2027, 2028) in each product and country table already include this markup — the year toggle switches between them, so the number you see is the one that applies to that year.
Why the markup exists
It is punitive by design. The default is meant to be the expensive option, so importers are pushed to obtain verified actual emissions from their suppliers, which are almost always lower than the marked-up default. See how to calculate your CBAM costs and run your own numbers in the exposure calculator.
Fertilisers are the exception
Fertiliser default values do not follow the 10/20/30 schedule. They rise by 1% a year instead, to reflect the sensitivities of the EU agricultural sector.
There is now an official CBAM price
On 7 April 2026 the Commission published the first official CBAM price — €75.36 per tonne of CO₂ for the first quarter. In 2026 the CBAM certificate price tracks the quarterly average of EU ETS auction prices; from 2027 it moves to a weekly average. The calculator uses the live ETS price as a proxy when it turns a default value into a euro figure.