This conference report summarizes the contributions to, and discussions at, the 9th EU-US transport task force workshop on `transport in fusion plasmas: transport near operational limits', held in Córdoba, Spain, during 9–12 September 2002. The workshop was organized under three main headings: edge localized mode physics and confinement, profile dynamics and confinement and confinement near operational limits: density and beta limits; this report follows the same structure.