2026 could become the hottest year on record as El Niño strengthens

According to a monthly assessment released Thursday by the research nonprofit Berkeley, a strong El Niño is intensifying droughts and floods that are driving up food costs and exacerbating wildfires. The event is now expected to make 2026 the hottest year ever recorded, eclipsing 2024.

The US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration further forecasts that 2026 is still unlikely to surpass the 2024 heat record but will narrowly miss it.

El Niño is a warm phase of global weather marked by unusual heating of the eastern tropical Pacific has temporarily aggravated human-caused global warming by pushing extended oceanic venting into the atmosphere for months.

A research scientist at Berkeley Earth, Zeke Hausfather said that there are some indicators that current baseline shifts are unparalleled over the past millennium.

Scientists are confident 2027 will be even hotter as atmospheric temperatures lag El Nino. Reports showed that last month was the second warmest September globally at 1.65C above the pre-industrial norm. This is slightly behind 2023 when the severe temperature deviation that Hausfather memorably dubbed it completely astonishing.

Nonetheless, September 2026 also registered the highest temperature anomaly for any month other than September 2023 and August 2026.

It is pertinent to mention here that fifty-three countries set national heat records including southwestern Europe, Spain, Portugal and Italy were devastated by unseasonal late-summer temperatures; moreover Singapore, United Arab Emirates and Burkina Faso ranked among eight countries that surpassed their previous national milestones by more than 0.5C.