{"id":2317,"date":"2026-08-04T18:39:22","date_gmt":"2026-08-04T18:39:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/topmovingpross.com\/?p=2317"},"modified":"2026-08-04T18:39:22","modified_gmt":"2026-08-04T18:39:22","slug":"this-summer-isnt-breaking-heat-records-yet-wait-until-el-nino-kicks-in-scientists-say","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/topmovingpross.com\/?p=2317","title":{"rendered":"This summer isn\u2019t breaking heat records \u2014 yet. Wait until El Nino kicks in, scientists say"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Wildfires are burning in North America and Europe. Deadly heat waves have parked over cities and the world\u2019s oceans are the hottest ever recorded for this time of year. A strengthening El Nino is forecast to be off-the-charts, spiking global temperatures and warping weather all over.<\/p>\n

Read more Afghanistan\u2019s child deaths are rising as food distributions face cuts, UN says<\/a><\/p>\n

While it may seem like the planet is baking through a record-shattering summer from hell, it\u2019s not quite in record territory. Yet. <\/p>\n

So far this is only the third-hottest year, behind 2024<\/span> and 2025, climate statistics<\/span> show. But give 2026 time. Because of a one-two punch of accelerated human-caused global warming<\/span> and a supersized El Nino<\/span>, there\u2019s an increasing chance that by the end of the year, 2026 could eke out the crown for the hottest year on record, eclipsing 2024 \u2014 or at least come close, scientists said.<\/p>\n

Even if this year sets the record, it won\u2019t last long. Although scientists disagree on whether 2026 will be the hottest year on record, they agree on it being a near lock that 2027 will beat out any modern year for heat, maybe by a great deal.<\/p>\n

\n<\/div>\n

With wars around the globe in the last few years people didn\u2019t pay much attention to climate change \u201cbecause the world was on fire in different ways. The world is now on fire again with climate change in a way that\u2019s increasingly difficult to ignore,\u201d said climate scientist Zeke Hausfather of Berkeley Earth. \u201cIt\u2019s going to keep getting worse.\u2019’<\/p>\n

Increasing odds for a record hot year<\/h2>\n

Hausfather calculated there\u2019s a 35% chance that 2026 will pass 2024 as the hottest year on record. But Hausfather keeps increasing those odds nearly every month \u2014 up from only 7% in March.<\/p>\n

Former top NASA climate scientist James Hansen, often called the godfather of climate science for 40 years of accurate long-term warnings<\/span>, predicted that 2026 will edge out 2024 at the end of the year.<\/p>\n

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The world\u2019s daily sea surface temperature tied 2024 starting in May and since June it\u2019s been record hot nearly every day<\/span>. With oceans more than 70% of the globe\u2019s surface, there\u2019s generally a month-and-a-half lag between heat showing up in oceans and then being reflected in the global average temperature, Hansen said. So it\u2019s about time that the entire globe starts shattering records, he said. About 82% of the world\u2019s ocean surface<\/span> is overheated with marine heat waves this year, according to Europe\u2019s Copernicus climate service.<\/p>\n

About a month ago the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration forecast that there was a 66% chance that 2026 would be the fourth hottest and only a 0.1% chance it would be No.1 for warmth by year\u2019s end. NOAA monitoring chief Russell Vose said those odds will be rising when NOAA finishes its analysis from July.<\/p>\n

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Hausfather said what\u2019s changing outlooks is the increasingly strong forecasts for a \u201cmind-numbing\u201d record-setting El Nino. <\/p>\n

El Nino is a natural temporary warming<\/span> of parts of the equatorial Pacific that heats up the globe\u2019s average temperature and warps weather extremes across the planet. Most forecasts have El Nino becoming the strongest in history. El Ninos always release pent-up heat in the ocean, but because of greenhouse gases trapping heat and 90% of it going into the world\u2019s seas, there\u2019s more heat to release, said Zachary Labe, a climate scientist at Climate Central, a science and communications nonprofit.<\/p>\n

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The amount of heat in the world\u2019s oceans \u2014 a marker of human-caused climate change \u2014 keeps setting new record highs<\/span>, Labe said.<\/p>\n

\n<\/div>\n

This summer\u2019s heat is human caused, not from El Nino<\/h2>\n

Climate scientists said what we\u2019ve seen this summer can\u2019t be blamed on El Nino because its impacts really don\u2019t kick in for a few more months. The fires, heat and extremes that have dominated the summer of 2026 are what scientists have long been warning about from the burning of coal, oil and gas.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cThe driver of the record warmth is climate change in the background. And it\u2019s a much larger \u2014 much, much larger \u2014 contribution than El Nino, which is just a tenth to two-tenths of a degree on top of that long-term trend,\u201d Labe said.<\/p>\n

That warming is accelerating, Hansen said. <\/p>\n

That\u2019s because traditional industrial pollution that creates soot and smog \u2014 which cool the planet and mask greenhouse gas-triggered warming \u2014 is decreasing, Hansen said. Also, it looks as if the climate might be reacting to greenhouse gases stronger than scientists anticipated, he said.<\/p>\n

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Heat waves keep hitting<\/h2>\n

This summer\u2019s heat waves have hit hard in places where people aren\u2019t used to triple-digit heat, unlike in the tropics, climate scientists said. And they\u2019ve been especially noticeable at night, making it hard for people to sleep, which impairs their health and their ability to be productive at work, said Samantha Burgess, global strategic lead at Copernicus climate service. <\/p>\n

She pointed to Europe, where there was an \u201cexceptional\u201d heat wave in May<\/span>, another in June<\/span>, two in July and another one going on now in France and Spain. <\/p>\n

\u201cEuropean heat waves are not in isolation. So there\u2019s also been shocking heat waves in North America<\/span>. There\u2019s been shockingly hot conditions in South America as well. There\u2019s been devastating<\/span> heat waves in India<\/span>,\u201d Burgess said. \u201cThere\u2019s always heat waves<\/span> somewhere in the world sometime, but what is very unusual for Europe for this particular year is the frequency and extent of the heat waves.\u201d<\/p>\n

Princeton University climate scientist Michael Oppenheimer said this is what scientists have long been warning about.<\/p>\n

\n<\/div>\n

\u201cThese are vivid pictures of not just the future, which is what we used to say, but on the whole of what climate change is doing. There\u2019s no question that climate change has increased the risk of wildfires<\/span>. There\u2019s no question that the climate change increased the probability of really hot, nasty, even unprecedented summers around the world.\u201d<\/p>\n

___<\/p>\n

The Associated Press\u2019 climate and environmental coverage receives financial support from multiple private foundations. AP is solely responsible for all content. Find AP\u2019s standards<\/span> for working with philanthropies, a list of supporters and funded coverage areas at AP.org<\/span>.<\/p>\n

Read more Palestinians hold mass funeral for 112 bodies finally recovered from a 2023 Gaza strike<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

With parts of the globe aflame in wildfires, deadly heat waves parking over cities, record hot oceans and a strengthening super El Nino, it seems like we\u2019re baking through the hottest year on record. But we\u2019re not quite there \u2014 yet. It’s only No. 3 in the record books. But it could be No. 1 soon. With the El Nino kicking in and accelerated warming, scientists say there\u2019s increasing likelihood that the second half of 2026 will be near record territory. Scientists say this summer’s warming is from human-caused climate change, not El Nino.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":2316,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2317","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-climate"],"yoast_head":"\nThis summer isn\u2019t breaking heat records \u2014 yet. 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