Potential For El Nino Year; Could Push Global Temps To Records In 2027 (23, 24, 25 Current Hottest Years)

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Weather agencies and climate scientists have pointed to the possibility of an El Niño forming in the Pacific Ocean later this year – a phenomenon that could push global temperatures to all-time record highs in 2027. Both the US government’s National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) and Australia’s Bureau of Meteorology have said some climate models are forecasting an El Niño but both cautioned those results came with uncertainties.

Experts told the Guardian it was too early to be confident, but there were signals in the spread of sea surface temperatures in the Pacific that suggested an El Niño could form in 2026. The cycle of ocean temperatures in the Pacific – known as the El Niño southern oscillation (ENSO) – is linked with extreme climate events around the world.

When warmer-than-average waters gather in the east of the equatorial Pacific and extend to the coast of the American continent, this is known as an El Niño and tends to give global temperatures a boost and, in Australia, can be linked to drier and hotter conditions.

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Dr Zeke Hausfather, a research scientist at the US-based independent Berkeley Earth research group, said an El Niño that formed in mid-2023 and lasted until around April 2024 had likely added about 0.12C to global temperatures in 2024. “If El Niño develops later this year it will likely peak around November-January and primarily impact 2027 global surface temperatures, rather than 2026. “This is why I have predicted that 2027 will likely set a new record [for global temperature] if a moderate to strong El Niño event ends up developing.”

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https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2026/feb/08/global-weather-el-nino-pacific-ocean-high-temperatures-2027

https://svs.gsfc.nasa.gov/5607

[OnlinePoker]

1. The most recent weekly ENSO update is rather interesting

All 4 ENSO zones in the regional anomalies are showing negative sea surface temperatures typical of La Nina. But further down in the sub-surface, the temperatures have soared across the region, expanding in five weeks from about the mid-Pacific to now, the entire width of the ocean. Next week's monthly update is going to be interesting as it seems an El Nino is coming on faster than predicted.

https://www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/products/analysis_monitoring/lanina/enso_evolution-status-fcsts-web.pdf