2027 could be warmest globally thanks to El Niño
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There’s a 100% chance that the El Niño complex weather pattern that we’re currently experiencing will last until at least February, according to the UN’s weather agency.
“If this trajectory continues, it may be stronger than anything since our monitoring began,” World Meteorological Organization secretary-general Celeste Saulo said at a news conference in Geneva on Thursday. “So literally off the charts we have used for the past four decades.”
Unfortunately, weeklong rains blamed on El Niño led to the deaths of at least 10 people in Chile in July, while drought in Central America led to emergency declarations in Honduras, El Salvador and Panama.
“It certainly can cause problems globally. Make storms stormier. It affects food supplies,” said Dave Phillips, longtime climatologist with Environment and Climate Change Canada, in an interview with CTV News.
An El Niño happens every two to seven years due to a warming of the tropical waters of the eastern Pacific.
The current one began in late spring and is happening as there’s already unprecedented ocean warmth globally, with the average temperature hitting a record high in August.
Many Canadians might know that El Niños are associated with milder than usual winters in Canada, and this one will likely be dominated by Pacific rather than Arctic air.
“This is a supercharged El Niño, but the backdrop for it is occurring when the oceans have never been warmer,” Phillips said.
U.S. forecasters say it’s 70% likely that the El Niño will exceed the strength of previous El Niño events all the way back to 1950.
Expected to peak in early winter
“It may peak in November, December,” Phillips said. “But it still will be with us right through until next spring, affecting our weather. This one is going to be generally a kind of a soft and open and tame kind of winter.”
And while homeowners could save on heating bills, it could mean less of the white stuff for skiers.
“We’re going to see less snow, more rain in the West, and that will lead to problems in the springtime: earlier forest fires, more drought,” Phillips said.
Meanwhile, Prairie farmers, who’ve seen lots of rain in 2026, could also be looking at a drier spring.
“They could be into a drought situation because there’s going to be less snow, less irrigation water, less precipitation,” Phillips said.
On the positive side, Atlantic Canada is looking at fewer storms this fall because El Niño tends to suppress Atlantic hurricane activity.
“It’s not going to be zero, but they’re going to be very few — fewer than they normally have been,” Phillips said.
The 2023-24 El Niño helped make 2024 the hottest year on record and WMO officials said Thursday that 2027 has the potential to break it.
“When they stick that thermometer in to find out what the temperature is, they’ll say, ‘Eureka, 2027 was the warmest year on record globally,’ both in the atmosphere and in the oceans,” Phillips said.