<p>This study investigates the structural robustness of the European Union’s international electricity trade network under the Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism (CBAM), a key regulation of the EU’s climate policy. This paper employs a directed and weighted network based on international electricity trade data to apply four different node removal scenarios: random node removal strategy, international node removal strategy in descending order of node metrics, carbon intensity-based node removal strategy and carbon-cost based node removal strategy. The structural vulnerability of the network measured using the giant component size and the Robustness Index. The results demonstrate that the removal of third countries playing a bridging roles in the trade network leads to more severe structural fragmentation. Additionally, it was determined that climate policy variables such as carbon pricing mechanisms and emission intensity have more strategic effects than international trade volume between third countries. Overall, the findings underscore that overlooking the structural role and environmental performance of third countries in CBAM implementation may inadvertently compromise the EU’s long-term energy security.</p>