Sectoral domestic price

As at 21 September 2026 no sectoral domestic price and no illustrative example had been published. The first price, for the quarter from January to March 2027, will rest on auctions held in the last quarter of 2026, and HMRC's policy summary, which is guidance and not law, states that the rates will be calculated and published by the government at the beginning of each quarter from 1 January 2027, with an illustrative example rate in autumn 2026.

How the price is built

Section 149(1) of the Finance Act 2026 charges CBAM at the sectoral domestic price multiplied by the tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent embodied in the good, and section 149(2) makes the price the one the Treasury calculates and publishes for the sector and for the quarter in which the liability is incurred. Section 149(3) sets two steps. Step 1 takes the mean average of the auction clearing prices for UK ETS allowances in the quarter preceding the quarter in question, or, if no allowances were sold at auction in that quarter, in the most recent quarter in which they were, as regulation 3 of SI 2026/809 provides. Step 2 reduces that price by a percentage equal to the baseline free allocation percentage for the sector, as adjusted under the regulations, which is the step that makes the price sectoral.

The price for a quarter is therefore anchored one quarter back, and an importer knows the starting point for the coming quarter's price as soon as the last auction of the preceding quarter has cleared. The quarter is the calendar quarter of import, whatever the accounting period: in the first accounting period, which runs for the whole of 2027 under regulation 2(3) of SI 2026/830, an importer applies four quarterly prices to four sets of consignments in one return. Chapter 6 of UK CBAM for Importers sets out the calculation step by step.