Articles · 2026-09-14
What is an EPR number — and why six countries cannot give you one
LUCID in Germany, IDU in France, BDO in Poland. In six of the 27 there is no packaging producer number at all — the form asks for what does not exist.
A marketplace asks for your EPR number. A customer's form has a box for it. It is a reasonable question with an unreasonable assumption behind it: that every country has one.
What is an EPR number?
The identifier a national producer register gives you when you sign up as the party that first makes packaging available on that market. Article 44 of Regulation (EU) 2025/40 makes that registration a precondition for selling there — not a formality afterwards.
One country, one register, one number. There is no EU-wide number, and the implementing act that would describe a common format was due on 12 February 2026 and has not arrived. A central EU register is not expected before 1 January 2029.
What is it called where you sell?
It has a different name and a different shape in almost every market. LUCID in Germany, and it is free. IDU in France, issued through SYDEREP — and one IDU per EPR stream, so household packaging and B2B packaging are separate. BDO in Poland, which is not a packaging register at all but the waste database, with packaging as one section of it.
Why can six countries not give you one?
Because the register does not exist yet. In our table, 21 of the 27 are live. Five are not: Bulgaria, Ireland, Italy, Latvia and the Netherlands. Romania has a register but its PPWR part is not assembled.
The reasons differ. Ireland has no packaging producer register — compliance runs through Repak, the only approved body. Latvia's environmental board says plainly there is no packaging producer register and no EPR numbers; registration happens with the regional board under the natural resources tax regime. The Netherlands expects a PPWR register in 2027.
Italy is the one that catches people
CONAI membership is not the EPR registration. It is the consortium you join and the environmental contribution you pay — but the PPWR producer register, RENAP, is still being set up. A supplier who sends you a CONAI number has sent you something real, and something that is not the thing the form asked for.
A form demands a number that does not exist. Now what?
Say so, and say where you checked. "There is no packaging producer register in this country as of this date, source: the environmental authority's own page" is an answer a buyer can file. A made-up number is not, and neither is silence.
This is why every row in our country table carries the register's status, the date it was checked and the page we read. An empty cell is information. A guessed number is not.
How do I apply for an EPR number?
You apply to the national register of every country where you first make packaging available, and you do it before the first sale there — Article 44 makes registration a condition of selling, not a formality afterwards. There is no single EU application and no single fee. Germany's LUCID is free and done online; entry in the Czech Seznam osob costs 800 CZK. The register, the authority and the fee for all 27 are in our country table, each line with its source and the date it was checked.
Is an EPR number the same as an EPR registration number?
Yes — the names differ, not the thing. In Germany it is the LUCID registration number, "DE" followed by 13 digits. In France it is an IDU, issued through SYDEREP, one per EPR stream. In Poland it is a BDO number in the waste database. There is still no EU-wide number: the implementing act that would set a common format was due on 12 February 2026 and has not appeared, and a central EU register is not expected before 1 January 2029.
How do I check a supplier's EPR number?
Where the register is public, you check it yourself. The German producer register is public and searchable by company name, and the result shows the registration number, the registration date and the brand names. Spain's MITECO publishes the list of registered producers as a file, updated roughly once a month, and is building a web service for automated checks under Article 45(5). The regulation requires that list to be publicly and freely accessible, so more countries should follow. Where a country has no register at all, there is nothing to check — and a number in that box came from somewhere else.
What Tarafex does with this
It produces the figure the register wants — kilograms by material and country, reusable kept apart, out of shipments you already record — and it stops there.
It does not register you, it is not your authorised representative, it pays no scheme, and it does not invent a number for a country that has none.
Sources: Regulation (EU) 2025/40, Article 44; Tarafex country table; Germany: LUCID; France: ADEME; Poland: BDO; Ireland: gov.ie; Latvia: State Environmental Service; Italy: Novatech; Romania: AFM; Germany: ZSVR, registration in LUCID; Spain: MITECO, list of registered producers; Czechia: Act 477/2001, § 30. Checked 17 September 2026. Not legal advice.