The CBAM Survival Boundary for Global Logistics: Carbon Data and Competitive Restructuring Through a Tri-Flow Coupling Framework

Abstract

The European Union's Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism (CBAM) presupposes that verified carbon emissions data can travel seamlessly alongside physical goods from foreign factories to EU customs authorities. This presupposition is wrong. Drawing on a systematic literature gap audit across 4,400 publications in carbon accounting, supply chain management, and trade facilitation, we identify a structural blind spot: no existing framework treats carbon data as an independent information flow with its own transmission dynamics, failure modes, and jurisdictional friction. To fill this gap, we propose the Tri-Flow Coupling Framework, which decomposes cross-border supply chains into three interdependent but operationally distinct mechanisms: the physical logistics flow, the carbon data flow, and the trust bypass. We introduce two quantitative constructs: the Carbon Data Continuity Score (CDCS), measuring node-by-node data integrity across seven standard supply chain nodes, and the Default Value Reliance rate (DVR), capturing the proportion of CBAM declarations that fall back on the EU's punitive default emission factors. Regression analysis across 55 trade routes covering steel, aluminum, and fertilizer exports to the EU yields four core findings. First, a 0.1-point improvement in CDCS is associated with a 6.15-percentage-point reduction in DVR (p < 0.001). Second, a threshold regression identifies a structural break at CDCS values between 0.35 and 0.40, below which the marginal effect of data improvement on compliance behavior approaches zero, indicating collective abandonment of actual-value reporting. Third, propensity score matching on 40 Houston-EU trade routes confirms that third-party verification operates through bypass rather than repair: it does not improve mid-chain data availability (p = 0.485) but raises terminal actual-value usage by 55 percentage points (p < 0.001). Fourth, a Carbon Data Capability Index (CDCI) applied to 15 global logistics enterprises reveals a systematic dimensional mismatch between carrier decarbonization investments and data transmission infrastructure, with technology middleware firms averaging 11.0 out of 12 versus ocean carriers at 7.25 out of 12. These findings establish carbon data logistics as a distinct problem space requiring its own theoretical vocabulary, empirical metrics, and policy interventions.

Keywords: CBAM compliance, carbon data logistics, supply chain carbon data, default value reliance, tri-flow coupling, carbon border adjustment, logistics decarbonization, cross-border carbon accounting, digital product passport, CDCS.