Published: 27/07/2017

El Niño events

CSIRO’s research vessel Investigator. This vessel supports Australia’s atmospheric, oceanographic, biological and geosciences research from the tropical north to the Antarctic ice-edge with the waters of the Indian, Pacific and Southern Oceans to:

– undertake deep sea oceanography;

– map and study the geology of Australia’s marine estate to underpin resource exploration;

– monitor and better understand Australia’s fisheries, and

– learn more about Australia’s weather patterns and large ocean processes.

The frequency of extreme El Niño events is projected to increase for a further century after global mean temperature is stabilised at 1.5°C above pre-industrial levels.

Research published on 24 July in Nature Climate Change by an international team shows that if warming was halted to the aspirational 1.5°C target from the Paris Agreement, the frequency of extreme El Niño events could continue to increase, due to a continuation of faster warming in the eastern equatorial Pacific.

CSIRO researcher and lead author Dr Guojian Wang said the growing risk of extreme El Niño events did not stabilise in a stabilised climate.