El Niño is here, and it's arriving early.
NOAA's latest update, released July 9, shows the Pacific Ocean warming faster than forecasters expected. The agency still puts the odds at 63% that this becomes a "very strong" El Niño by winter, a level reached only a handful of times since 1950. NOAA predicts a 97-98% chance that it lasts into early 2027.
It's on track to be one of the strongest El Niños in 70 years, and it's expected to shape weather, and energy demand, across most of the country this winter.
A potentially historic El Niño
Only three El Niños since 1950 have hit this level: 1982-83, 1997-98, and 2015-16. NOAA calls them the three strongest on record. That's the company this winter is now expected to keep.
The best comparison is 1997-98, the most well-documented of the three. That winter, the northern two-thirds of the country ran warmer than normal, with less snow than usual. The southern third got hit with storms instead. Central California saw rain as high as 240% of normal, and the flooding and mudslides that followed caused hundreds of millions of dollars in damage around San Francisco Bay.
Even the Pacific Northwest, which usually stays calmer during El Niño, took a beating: six major storms hit the Washington and Oregon coast, generating waves over 33 feet. Tornadoes hit Florida. An ice storm hit the Northeast.
In all, 189 deaths were attributed to El Niño. It was one of the most disruptive winters on record.
What "very strong" actually means
El Niño works by shifting the jet stream. In a typical El Niño winter, storms slide south, bringing wetter weather to the southern US while the northern half runs milder and drier. It also tends to mean a quieter Atlantic hurricane season, a busier Pacific one, and a higher risk of coastal flooding where storms and high tides overlap.
Here’s what the NOAA forecast currently anticipates, region by region.
Pacific Northwest to the Northern Plains: milder, drier winter favored
NOAA gives the Pacific Northwest, northern Rockies, and northern Great Plains better than 50% odds of a warmer than normal December through February. Drier conditions are favored too, a trend that could show up as early as this summer.
Great Lakes and Ohio Valley: warmer and drier
NOAA favors drier than normal conditions across the Great Lakes and Ohio Valley by late fall and winter, a typical El Niño pattern for this corridor. On temperature, the northern US is expected to stay warmer than normal through the heart of winter, and this region is broadly included.
Southern Plains, Gulf Coast, and Southeast: wetter, stormier
Flip the pattern for the South. NOAA favors above-normal rain and snow across the southern US this winter, with odds topping 60% in parts of the Southeast. It's the same setup that dropped record rain on California and spun up tornadoes in Florida back in 1997-98.
West Coast: an active storm season and higher flood risk
NOAA flags a higher risk of coastal flooding this El Niño, especially on the West Coast, where a stormier winter meets already elevated seas. California tends to see a more active storm season in strong El Niño years, and 1997-98 is the textbook example of what that can mean for flooding and coastal erosion.
Northeast and New England: no clear forecast yet
CPC's summer outlook already leans warm and slightly wet for the region, with above-normal temperature odds reaching into southern New England and a modest lean toward above-normal precipitation across the Northeast. Winter is a different story.
New England sits right on the seam between NOAA's milder "northern tier" and its "equal chances" southern zone, and the current outlook does not tip the region firmly toward warm, cold, wet, or dry for December through February.
How we built this outlook
This piece combines two NOAA sources: the Climate Prediction Center's seasonal outlook maps for temperature and precipitation, which give region-by-region odds for the months ahead, and its monthly ENSO update, which tracks the ocean data behind the event itself. We also checked the regional detail against what past strong El Niños actually did, rather than relying on the maps alone.
El Niño is here, strengthening, and likely to stay very strong through winter. What's still uncertain is the fine detail: exactly where the dry line falls in the Midwest, how much rain hits California, whether a single cold snap cuts through an otherwise mild winter.
Those specifics will keep sharpening as NOAA updates its forecast through the fall. Sunnyside will track it, especially heading into the September and October releases, when the picture usually comes into focus.
Systems Architect at Daylight. Sunnyside is Daylight’s guide to energy, the grid, and the weather that moves your bill.