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Carbon price relief · HMRC guidance published 16 Jul 2026

Already paid a carbon price abroad? UK CBAM gives credit for it.

The UK CBAM charge is reduced, pound for pound, by any qualifying carbon price your supply chain has already paid on the same emissions — an emissions trading scheme (like the EU ETS), a carbon tax, or an import carbon-pricing scheme — capped at your liability. For goods from carbon-priced economies this can be the difference between a painful bill and a small one. Almost nobody is talking about it, and the evidence has to be collected during 2027, not at filing time in 2028.

Quick check — does relief apply to you?

The official list — 16 schemes recognised (so far)

On 27 August 2026 HMRC published the first official list of qualifying carbon pricing schemes — if your goods' emissions were priced under any of these, relief is on the table:

Three honest caveats, straight from the guidance: the list is provisional (assessed as of 19 June 2026, updates promised — we watch the page and will email alert subscribers); it is not exhaustive — an unlisted scheme that meets the criteria can still qualify; and being listed doesn't guarantee money back — emissions covered by free allowances carry no effective price, and rebates or refunds net off. Which is exactly why the verification form matters.

What it's worth — a worked illustration

Say you import 100 tonnes of steel at 2.0 tCO2e/tonne — 200 tCO2e embodied. At our labelled scenario rate of £49.25/tCO2e that's a gross charge of £9,850. If your supplier evidences an effective carbon price of £20/tCO2e actually paid on those emissions, relief is 200 × £20 = £4,000 off — a net charge of £5,850. If the evidenced effective price is at or above the UK rate, the charge on those goods can fall to zero (relief is capped at the liability — it never goes negative).

The evidence kit

  1. The official form. HMRC's Carbon Pricing Verification Form (published 13 July 2026) — completed by an independent verifier, not by the supplier alone. HMRC's claiming-relief guidance sets out the qualifying-scheme tests.
  2. The supplier ask. Copy, adapt, send — the competitive-advantage framing at the end genuinely helps response rates:
    Subject: Carbon price evidence for UK CBAM — one form, saves us both money

Hi [name],

From January 2027 the UK charges us CBAM on the goods we buy from you.
If your production already pays a carbon price (an ETS or carbon tax),
the UK deducts that from our bill — but only with evidence.

Could you confirm:
1. Which carbon pricing scheme applies to [installation name]?
2. The effective price actually paid per tonne of CO2e, after any free
   allocation, rebates or refunds?
3. Whether you can have HMRC's Carbon Pricing Verification Form completed
   by an independent verifier? (We'll send the form and its guidance.)

This directly reduces what we pay — which keeps your goods competitive
against suppliers who can't evidence a carbon price.

Thanks,
[you]
  3. See it in your numbers. Add a “Carbon price paid (GBP/tCO2e)” column to your import ledger and run the liability preview — relief is computed per line, capped the way the regulations cap it, with the working shown.

Collecting supplier emissions data anyway (you should be)? The supplier data template and the carbon-price conversation are the same conversation — have it once.

Basis: FA 2026 s.150; S.I. 2026/809 regs 12–13 (made 13 Jul 2026); HMRC carbon price relief guidance collection (16 Jul 2026); official qualifying-schemes list (27 Aug 2026, provisional). Rules basis draft-2; last reviewed 2026-08-31. General information, not tax advice.