This summer isn't breaking heat records — yet. Wait until El Nino kicks
in, scientists say
[August 05, 2026]
By SETH BORENSTEIN
Wildfires are burning in North America and Europe. Deadly heat waves
have parked over cities and the world's 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.
While it may seem like the planet is baking through a record-shattering
summer from hell, it's not quite in record territory. Yet.
So far this is only the third-hottest year, behind 2024 and 2025,
climate statistics show. But give 2026 time. Because of a one-two punch
of accelerated human-caused global warming and a supersized El Nino,
there's an increasing chance that by the end of the year, 2026 could eke
out the crown for the hottest year on record, eclipsing 2024 — or at
least come close, scientists said.
Even if this year sets the record, it won't 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.
With wars around the globe in the last few years people didn't pay much
attention to climate change "because the world was on fire in different
ways. The world is now on fire again with climate change in a way that’s
increasingly difficult to ignore,” said climate scientist Zeke
Hausfather of Berkeley Earth. “It's going to keep getting worse.''
Increasing odds for a record hot year
Hausfather calculated there's a 35% chance that 2026 will pass 2024 as
the hottest year on record. But Hausfather keeps increasing those odds
nearly every month — up from only 7% in March.
Former top NASA climate scientist James Hansen, often called the
godfather of climate science for 40 years of accurate long-term
warnings, predicted that 2026 will edge out 2024 at the end of the year.
The world's daily sea surface temperature tied 2024 starting in May and
since June it's been record hot nearly every day. With oceans more than
70% of the globe's surface, there's 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's about time that the entire
globe starts shattering records, he said. About 82% of the world's ocean
surface is overheated with marine heat waves this year, according to
Europe's Copernicus climate service.
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's end. NOAA monitoring chief Russell Vose said those odds will be
rising when NOAA finishes its analysis from July.
Hausfather said what's changing outlooks is the increasingly strong
forecasts for a “mind-numbing” record-setting El Nino.
El Nino is a natural temporary warming of parts of the equatorial
Pacific that heats up the globe's 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's seas, there's more heat to release, said Zachary Labe, a
climate scientist at Climate Central, a science and communications
nonprofit.
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A baseball fan cools off before a game between the San Diego Padres
and the Chicago Cubs in Chicago, July 1, 2026. (AP Photo/Nam Y. Huh,
File)
 The amount of heat in the world's
oceans — a marker of human-caused climate change — keeps setting new
record highs, Labe said.
This summer's heat is human caused, not from El Nino
Climate scientists said what we've seen this summer can't be blamed
on El Nino because its impacts really don't 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.
“The driver of the record warmth is climate change in the
background. And it’s a much larger — much, much larger —
contribution than El Nino, which is just a tenth to two-tenths of a
degree on top of that long-term trend,” Labe said.
That warming is accelerating, Hansen said.
That's because traditional industrial pollution that creates soot
and smog — which cool the planet and mask greenhouse gas-triggered
warming — is decreasing, Hansen said. Also, it looks as if the
climate might be reacting to greenhouse gases stronger than
scientists anticipated, he said.
Heat waves keep hitting
This summer’s heat waves have hit hard in places where people aren’t
used to triple-digit heat, unlike in the tropics, climate scientists
said. And they've 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.
She pointed to Europe, where there was an “exceptional” heat wave in
May, another in June, two in July and another one going on now in
France and Spain.
“European heat waves are not in isolation. So there’s also been
shocking heat waves in North America. There’s been shockingly hot
conditions in South America as well. There’s been devastating heat
waves in India,” Burgess said. “There’s always heat waves 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.”
Princeton University climate scientist Michael Oppenheimer said this
is what scientists have long been warning about.
"These 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’s no question that climate change has increased the risk of
wildfires. There’s no question that the climate change increased the
probability of really hot, nasty, even unprecedented summers around
the world.”
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