FAQ, CBAM and French Customs: an interesting update

The French Customs published its “frequently questions & aswers” about the following points:

Import/export of packaging: “ …Nomenclatures 7310 and 7612 are included in Annex 1 of the CBAMregulation. When this packaging is released for free circulation, it is covered by the CBAM. When this packaging is intended to be re-exported, it can benefit from the temporary admission regime which is not a customs regime subject to the CBAM…”;
Freight: “…The threshold of €150 per shipment excludes customs-cleared shipments with Delta H7. In contrast, express freight shipments cleared through Delta X and Delta G are covered by the CBAM.
Customs regime: “The CBAM is applicable to all procedures giving rise to the release for free circulation of goods in the customs territory of the Union.”
Reporting declarant “ …The authorized CBAM declarant is the importer. The regulation provides that this is the importer declaring his imports to customs on his own behalf, or the indirect customs representative who agrees to be an authorized CBAM declarant on behalf of his clients. Importers not established on the TDU (European Customs Territory) must use the services of an indirect customs representative with the status of “authorized CBAM declarant”. During the transition period (during which the status of “authorized CBAM declarant” is not obligatory), the subsidiary of a group, a consulting firm, a service provider, a tax representative etc. can only act for an importer if They are also RDE in indirect representation. For the final period (from 2026), the rules remain to be defined in an implementing regulation which will be discussed at the end of 2025. One of the working options is to dissociate customs obligations from CBAM obligations, provided that an authorized importer is clearly identified at the time the goods are released for free circulation…”
Customs representative: “…In direct representation, the importer is responsible for his obligations with regard to the CBAM regulation. In indirect representation, the agreement of the customs representative to carry the CBAM representation of his client is necessary. If he agrees, the CBAM obligations will fall to the customs representative…”
EORI “…France is currently the only Member State to issue multiple EORIs based on SIRET. The evolution of European regulations induces a switch, planned until 12/31/2025, towards a single EORI based on SIREN. In this context, applications for “Authorized MACF Reporter Status” must be filed using the EORI/SIREN number only. For companies that do not yet have this number, the creation of these EORI/SIREN has been open to operators via the SOPRANO EORI customs application since April 2023….”;
How to get the status of customs representative: “…The status of “ CBAM declarant” can be requested from January 2025 in anticipation of its implementation in its normal operating phase, on January 1, 2026. The request must be made to the competent authority of the corresponding Member State to the EORI identifier of the importer. Once the status is obtained, it will be valid in all Member States. The format and procedure for obtaining this status will be available in the implementing acts of the CBAM Regulation which must be published in July 2023…”;
AEO: “…Authorized economic operator (AEO) status can be issued by customs at the request of an operator. It offers customs facilities for “trusted” operators. The status of authorized MACF declarant is a status granted by the national competent authority for MACF (the DGEC) for the application of non-customs regulations. Also the AEO status has no direct impact on the issuance of the authorized MACF declarant status…”;
Forms for CBAM “ …The European Commission will publish guidelines, explanatory documents and templates for data reporting…”;
Data to be declared: “…For any request concerning the methods of calculating the data to be declared, operators can contact the competent authority for this regulation, namely the General Directorate of Energy and Climate (DGEC) of the Ministry of Energy Transition…”;
How declare CBAM data: “ domain has been created by the European Commission in UUMDS (DG TAXUD portal). All MACF procedures will take place there (reporting, purchase of certificates). In France, this portal will be accessible via the customs.gouv account. The teleservice leading to the MACF portal will be visible to the UUMDS administrators of each company who will be able to directly assign access rights to the relevant personnel in their company. Specific communication will be carried out as soon as the accessibility of the platform is effective…”
Management of inward process relief: a) the goods imported under IPR are eligible for CBAM “…Yes. When the third-party product appears in Annex 1, I am subject to the obligations of the mechanism even if the finished product does not appear there…”; b) the finished good could be fall under the group of HS codes listed by CBAM “…Yes. When the finished product falls under Annex 1, I am subject to the obligations of the mechanism for the part of third-party products implemented within the framework of the PA (inward process relief); c) no eligibility for goods reexported “…The MACF is only applicable to goods released for free circulation in the customs territory of the Union. In the case of an import It is applicable as soon as this method of clearance of the suspensive regime is chosen by the economic operator. Consequently, it is not applicable to transit or to the temporary admission regime which cannot be discharged by release for free circulation…”;
Temporary admission: “…The temporary admission regime allows the temporary import of non-Union goods intended to be re-exported as is (e.g. exhibition, commercial samples). This plan is not covered by the CBAM…”;
Free circulation for maintenance: “….On the other hand, goods released for free circulation to allow maintenance operations to be carried out on the TDU and then exported are covered by the CBAM since a release for free circulation has taken place and this is the trigger…”
Returned goods “…When the imported goods are returned goods, the latter are mentioned separately in the MACF declaration with the mention “zero” for the total embodied emissions corresponding to these goods…”
Intrinsic value: “…The intrinsic value of a shipment is the price of the goods themselves when sold for export to the TDU, excluding freight and insurance costs, unless these are included in the price and are not indicated separately on the invoice, and all other taxes and charges that can be verified by the customs authorities from any relevant document…”.

It is interesting to recall the following points:

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The Carbon boder adjustement mechanism (CBAM) entered into force on 15 May 2023 by means of the EU regulation 2023/956 of 10 May 2023 establishing a carbon border adjustment mechanism (CBAM) has been published on the Official Journal. Its article 36 lays down that “… This Regulation shall enter into force on the day following that of its publication in the Official Journal of the European Union…”.

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On 10 May 2023, European Commission published the memo with “Questions and Answers: Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism (CBAM)”.

The first question is “…Why is the EU putting in place a Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism?…”

The EU is at the forefront of international efforts to fight climate change. Indeed, the EU Commission added “…The European Green Deal set out a clear path towards realising the EU’s ambitious target of a 55% reduction in carbon emissions compared to 1990 levels by 2030, and to become a climate-neutral continent by 2050. In July 2021, the Commission made its Fit for 55 policy proposals to turn this ambition into reality, further establishing the EU as a global climate leader. Since then, those policies have taken shape through negotiations with co- legislators, the European Parliament and the Council, and many have now been signed into EU law. This includes the EU’s plan for a Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism (CBAM).
As we raise our own climate ambition and less stringent environmental and climate policies prevail in non-EU countries, there is a strong risk of so-called ‘carbon leakage’ – i.e. companies based in the EU could move carbon-intensive production abroad to take advantage of lax standards, or EU products could be replaced by more carbon-intensive imports. Such carbon leakage can shift emissions outside of Europe and therefore seriously undermine EU as well as global climate efforts. The CBAM will equalise the price of carbon between domestic products and imports of a selected number of products and ensure that the EU’s climate objectives are not undermined by production relocating to countries with less ambitious policies. The CBAM is therefore a climate measure that should prevent the risk of carbon leakage and support the EU’s increased ambition on
climate mitigation, while ensuring WTO compatibility. The European Parliament and the Council of the European Union, as co-legislators, signed the final CBAM Regulation on 10 May 2023. The provisions underpinning the CBAM, and its operational features will now progressively enter into force and application…”.

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In a nutshell, the reporting declarant shall provide the following information:

the quantity of the goods imported, expressed in megawatt hours for electricity and in tonnes for other goods;
the type of goods as identified by their CN code.,
the country of origin of the imported goods;
the installation where it was produced, identified by the following data: the applicable United Nations Code for Trade and Transport Location (UN/LOCODE) of the location; the applicable United Nations Code for Trade and Transport Location (UN/LOCODE) of the location; geographical coordinates of the main emission source of the installation
the production routes used, which shall reflect the technological option for the production of the goods, and information on specific parameters qualifying the indicated production route chosen;
the descriptive parameters that have an effect on the embedded emissions;
for steel goods, the identification number of the specific steel mill where a particular batch of raw materials came from, where known;
the specific direct emissions of the goods, which shall be determined by converting the attributed embedded direct emissions of the production processes into emissions specific of the goods defined as CO₂e per tonne;

For indirect emissions, each reporting declarant shall in addition report the following information in the CBAM reports:

electricity consumption;
the indication whether the declarant reports actual emissions or default values;
the corresponding emissions factor;
the amount of specific indirect emissions.

The trade compliance obligations related to CBAM require the AEO approach: monitoring of internal processes, reporting, KPI, high knowledge of the customs regulations, ongoing risk assessment. The AEO authorization is based on the following pillars: classification, value and origin. These areas are monitored from the (SAQ) self assessment questionnaire.