The Royal Dutch Steel Federation has warned that the introduction of the EU’s Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism (CBAM) is creating significant short-term uncertainty and cost risks for Dutch steel importers and manufacturers.
While CBAM is designed to prevent carbon leakage by aligning import carbon costs with those faced by EU producers, the Federation said the current framework lacks a clear and operational verification system. Imports made in 2026 will only be financially settled in 2027, leaving companies uncertain about the actual carbon costs they will face. As a result, pricing decisions have become more complex, with higher costs likely to be passed on to customers.
A major concern is the mandatory use of “default values” for embedded carbon emissions. These values, set by the European Commission, are often significantly higher than companies’ actual emissions, which are already documented under frameworks such as CSRD reporting. In the absence of a functioning verification mechanism, importers are required to apply these elevated defaults, artificially inflating steel prices, according to the Federation.
Additional challenges include administrative complexity, registration requirements for importers exceeding 50 metric tons of steel or aluminium, and long-term contracts becoming economically unviable due to higher carbon cost assumptions. The Federation warned that these distortions could shift demand toward downstream products imported from outside the EU, undermining fair competition.
The group has called for simplification of CBAM and the introduction of a practical verification mechanism by July 1, 2026, to allow the use of verified actual emissions data and improve price certainty for businesses.
VietnamSteel by Hoa Sen Group
