El Niño is a natural climate event that can cause problems like crop failures, wildfires, droughts, floods, and more. Predictions suggest there’s a high chance of strong El Niño events in 2023-2024. It might bring about the first year where global temperatures surpass 1.5°C, a significant climate target. El Niño is becoming more frequent and severe due to climate change. It affects different regions in various ways, causing wetter conditions in some places and droughts in others.
This phenomenon is a natural occurrence where the Pacific Ocean gets warmer than usual. It disrupts normal weather patterns and creates impacts across the world. El Niño has a counterpart called La Niña, and both together make up the El Niño-Southern Oscillation (ENSO) cycle.
This natural event causes global effects, leading to problems like crop failures, more wildfires, floods, droughts, and conflicts. It worsens the impacts of climate change that countries and ecosystems are already experiencing.
Extreme El Niño and La Niña events have become more frequent due to climate change. Climate projections show more frequent and severe events in the future. Human-caused warming might be partly responsible for these changes.
El Niño affects regions differently, causing wetter or drier conditions, fires, and disruptions to agriculture and ecosystems. It can lead to higher disease risks, worsen air pollution, and affect hurricane activity. Remember, El Niño is a complex natural event, and while this summary covers the basics, there’s a lot more to learn about its effects and interactions with climate change.
