Glossary
CBAM operator
Under the EU's Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism (CBAM), a person that operates or controls an installation outside the EU, including a parent company that controls one. It can register in the CBAM registry and share verified emissions data with declarants.
- Legal source
- CBAM Regulation, Article 3(31) ↗
- Who it applies to
- Producers outside the EU of goods covered by CBAM, and parent companies that control their installations. Registration is optional: the Commission registers an operator at its request. A registered operator must determine the embedded emissions of its goods and have them verified by an accredited verifier.
- Example
- A company in India runs a plant that makes steel bolts sold to EU importers, and a parent company controls the plant. Both are operators under CBAM. If the company registers, it can pass the verified emissions data to the importers' authorised CBAM declarants.
- Also known as
- installation operator
An installation is a stationary technical unit where a production process is carried out. The obligations to declare embedded emissions and surrender CBAM certificates sit with the
A registered operator must:
- determine the
embedded emissions - have them verified by a verifier accredited under CBAM
- keep the verification report and its records for four years after the verification
- determine, where applicable, the carbon price paid outside the EU
A registration is valid for five years from its notification to the operator.
Pending, not law: Commission proposal COM(2025) 989 would base a declaration on actual emissions only on emissions provided by the operator via the CBAM registry.
Our explainer for producers outside the EU covers registration and verification, and our explainer on default values and actual emissions covers the data declarants need.
Regulations
Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism (CBAM)
Implementing Regulation (EU) 2026/1740 corrected Annexes I and IV of the default values act, Implementing Regulation (EU) 2025/2621
Used in
EU CBAM default values or actual emissions: which to use, and how embedded emissions are calculated
Under the EU CBAM, you declare embedded emissions from verified supplier data or from default values with a mark-up. How to choose, and what to ask suppliers.
EU CBAM for producers and exporters outside the EU: registration, verification and who pays
Making steel, aluminium, cement or fertiliser in India or elsewhere outside the EU? What EU CBAM means for you: optional registration, verification, who pays.
EU CBAM simplification: what Regulation (EU) 2025/2083 changed
EU CBAM simplification: a 50-tonne yearly threshold replaced the €150 exemption, the deadline moved to 30 September and the quarterly holding fell to 50%.