The EU is currently in the process of “simplifying” many of its sustainability laws and regulations. We’ve written about the EU Council and Parliament reaching a political position on amendments to the Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism (CBAM). Now those amendments are official as the EU Council signed off on the new regulation this week. A press release from the Council states:
“Replacing the current threshold exempting from CBAM goods of negligible value, the amendments set a new ‘de minimis’ mass threshold whereby imports up to 50 tonnes per importer per year will not be subject to CBAM rules. The measure is expected to exempt from CBAM mainly SMEs and individuals, which import small or negligible quantities of goods covered by the CBAM regulation.”
CBAM is designed to help equalize trade imbalances or advantages due to differing carbon tax schemes for certain imports. Its goal is to place importers on equal footing with EU companies participating in the EU Emissions Trading System (ETS). The council expects that CBAM will still capture 99% of embedded emissions under the new rules. The amendments also attempt to simplify the authorization, data collection, emissions calculation, verification, and financial liability calculation processes, making it easier for importers to comply with the law. CBAM is one of the first EU sustainability laws to complete the “simplification” process. Simplification measures are still pending for the CSRD, CSDDD, and EUDR, among other regulations. Unlike some of the other simplification proposals, CBAM remains mostly intact.
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