How ‘Super El Niño’ adds fuel to the climate fire

An El Niño is declared when waters in the equatorial Pacific rise 0.5 degrees Celsius above their long-term average. This naturally occurring phenomenon can shift weather systems across the globe and wreak havoc to the tune of billions — or even trillions — of dollars. But this year the results will be more extreme, combining with global warming to deliver what’s being called a “Super El Niño.” With worse droughts, bigger wildfires and larger floods, it may open a window into what climate change will look like in the future.

On this Bloomberg Originals weekly documentary, we explain the potentially catastrophic costs to commodities, supply chains and whole nations of this El Niño, which is expected to be the worst in at least 76 years. “El Niño is not just knocking on the door,” said António Guterres, Secretary-General of the United Nations, in his address at London Climate Action Week in June. “It risks blowing the house down.”

El Niño arrives at a time when global surface air temperatures have increased by around 1.4°C since the pre-industrial era. Its effects may already be presenting themselves. Parts of Europe are experiencing record heat waves while wildfires in Spain and France have approached densely populated areas. Waterways such as the Rhine and Danube are running low, hampering transport and energy production.


In India, where June was its driest in 12 years, July brought heavy rains to Mumbai, killing at least 13 people. In the Himalayan region and across to the west coast, flash floods have killed dozens more and displaced thousands. In East Asia, Typhoon Dolphin has flooded parts of central China, with the region’s storm season shaping up to be one of the most intense on record.

Worldwide, the financial toll of this year’s event is expected to exceed $4 trillion through 2030, said Wenju Cai, a professor at Xiamen University. Such costs will far outpace extremely strong El Niño events in 2016 and 1998, he said, both “because the global economy has grown and because of the greater intensity.”