{"id":1143,"date":"2026-07-21T11:06:03","date_gmt":"2026-07-21T11:06:03","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/movingandmortgagehub.com\/?p=1143"},"modified":"2026-07-21T11:06:03","modified_gmt":"2026-07-21T11:06:03","slug":"oceans-are-absorbing-huge-amounts-of-heat-and-sending-some-of-it-ashore","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/movingandmortgagehub.com\/?p=1143","title":{"rendered":"Oceans Are Absorbing Huge Amounts of Heat\u2014and Sending Some of It Ashore"},"content":{"rendered":"
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This story was originally published by\u00a0<\/em>Grist\u00a0and\u00a0is reproduced here as part of the\u00a0<\/em>Climate Desk\u00a0collaboration.<\/em><\/p>

Read more Florida\u2019s Nursing Homes Are Bracing for Life Without Haitian TPS Workers<\/a><\/p>\n

It\u2019s barely the<\/span> middle of summer in the northern hemisphere, and heat waves are once again breaking temperature records.\u00a0<\/p>\n

In the United States, dozens of cities sweltered through their hottest Fourth of July celebrations, with temperatures over 100 degrees F. In New Jersey alone, dozens died from the heat over that weekend. European authorities have linked thousands of deaths during the end of June to heat-related causes. And last Thursday, the European Union\u2019s Copernicus Climate Change Service announced that Western Europe had experienced\u00a0the hottest June ever recorded in the region.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The seas are running a fever, too. It was also the hottest June on record for the world\u2019s oceans, according to Copernicus. Nearly 40 percent of ocean area worldwide is undergoing a marine heatwave, with intense hot patches in the Mediterranean Sea and the Pacific Ocean more than 10 degrees F hotter than usual. It\u2019s the latest in a wave of ocean warming that began in 2023, fueling devastating cyclones and damaging the majority of the planet\u2019s coral reefs.\u00a0<\/p>\n

As humans burn fossil fuels, the oceans absorb more than 90 percent of the excess heat trapped by the resulting\u00a0greenhouse gases, causing them to warm. Waters at the surface also exchange heat and moisture with the atmosphere, helping to drive hotter temperatures and more extreme weather. A recent study found that at least a fifth of\u00a0heatwaves on land\u00a0begin in the ocean.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cHeat is one of the features of climate change that has already arrived,\u201d said Ruth Engel, a data scientist for environmental health and extreme heat with the World Resources Institute. \u201cIt\u2019s not something we need to prepare for 25 years from now. It\u2019s already a deadly health issue now.\u201d<\/p>\n

In mild climates and historically hot ones alike, extreme heat has become an expected part of summer, Engel said. Last year, more people died from extreme heat than from road crashes in Europe, she added.<\/p>\n

Because weather, climate, and oceans are so intertwined, it can take months for scientists to pinpoint the cause of any one heat event. But there are some early clues that can help researchers connect weather events to ocean heatwaves, said Zachary Labe, a scientist at Climate Central, a research nonprofit.For example, scientists suspect that the recent heatwaves across Europe are tied to extra-warm temperatures in the Mediterranean Sea, he said. And the high temperatures and humidity causing Floridians to crank up their air-conditioners are probably related to a marine heatwave with water temperatures near 90 degrees F off the state\u2019s Gulf coast. Unusually warm temperatures in the Pacific Ocean may have helped set up a weather pattern driving a potentially record-breaking heatwave forecast for the central and northern U.S. in the coming week, he said.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe current patterns that are creating these heat domes are similar to those we\u2019ve seen before,\u201d Labe said.\u00a0 \u201cBut climate change is just acting to boost everything.\u201d Essentially, warmer global temperatures mean worse consequences when extreme weather does hit, he said.<\/p>

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Hotter air also makes the atmosphere spongier and capable of holding more water. For every 1 degree C of warming, the atmosphere can hold about 7 percent more moisture. It also holds onto the water for longer. That means more time between rainfalls, and heavier, more dangerous deluges when rain does fall.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Scientists have linked climate change to heavy rainfall events such as the one that\u00a0flooded Central Texas\u00a0last summer. In recent days, Super Typhoon Bavi bore down on the Mariana Islands in the Western Pacific. It\u2019s the second super typhoon with the\u00a0\u201cfingerprint of climate change\u201d\u00a0to form in the region in a handful of months.<\/p>\n

Ocean warming is also a direct cause of sea level rise thanks to a phenomenon known as thermal expansion. As the seas warm, they expand and push further up coastlines, setting the stage for storms like Bavi to cause greater damage.<\/p>\n

And recently, a\u00a0recurring pattern of warm water known as El Ni\u00f1o\u00a0began cycling through the Pacific, adding even more extreme weather to the equation. That\u2019s because El Ni\u00f1o churns up some of the heat that the ocean absorbs, bringing it toward the surface where it interacts with the atmosphere and reshapes weather around the world. This year\u2019s emerging event, considered a \u201csuper El Ni\u00f1o,\u201d has an 81 percent chance of becoming one of the strongest in history, according to a recent forecast by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.<\/p>\n

That means global average temperatures are likely to remain elevated well into early next year, said Matthew England, a professor of physical oceanography and climate science at the University of New South Wales in Australia. \u201cThe first year of an El Ni\u00f1o cycle tends to be on the warm side, but the records are generally broken in the second year,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Every El Ni\u00f1o is different, but each one comes with predictable effects that can help forecasters figure out what to expect, said Alex Sen Gupta, a professor at the Climate Change Research Center, also at the University of New South Wales.\u00a0<\/p>\n

In general, El Ni\u00f1o years are associated with heavier rainfall in places like California and South America and drier conditions across Australia and Southeast Asia. And although El Ni\u00f1o tends to suppress hurricanes near the United States, other regions tend to see stronger cyclones with more rainfall.<\/p>\n

There isn\u2019t evidence yet that climate change is making El Ni\u00f1os or La Ni\u00f1as (the inverse pattern of cool water that forms in intervening years) stronger. But a hotter planet means more intense effects from both of them, Sen Gupta said. And while scientists need more years of data to say for sure,\u00a0some have hypothesized\u00a0that the swings between strong El Ni\u00f1o and La Ni\u00f1a years are becoming more frequent.<\/p>

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Warming seas are fueling extreme weather and heat waves on land.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1141,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1143","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-environment"],"yoast_head":"\nOceans Are Absorbing Huge Amounts of Heat\u2014and Sending Some of It Ashore - Moving and Mortgage Hub<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/movingandmortgagehub.com\/?p=1143\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Oceans Are Absorbing Huge Amounts of Heat\u2014and Sending Some of It Ashore - Moving and Mortgage Hub\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Warming seas are fueling extreme weather and heat waves on land.\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/movingandmortgagehub.com\/?p=1143\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Moving and Mortgage Hub\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2026-07-21T11:06:03+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/movingandmortgagehub.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/83670a6c1008b71dd21edc96851786d7-1024x575.webp\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"1024\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"575\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/webp\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"admin\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"admin\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"5 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\\\/\\\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/movingandmortgagehub.com\\\/?p=1143#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/movingandmortgagehub.com\\\/?p=1143\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"admin\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/movingandmortgagehub.com\\\/#\\\/schema\\\/person\\\/6b7c79bcfd888d98f34c5413df7e81a2\"},\"headline\":\"Oceans Are Absorbing Huge Amounts of Heat\u2014and Sending Some of It Ashore\",\"datePublished\":\"2026-07-21T11:06:03+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/movingandmortgagehub.com\\\/?p=1143\"},\"wordCount\":1039,\"commentCount\":0,\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/movingandmortgagehub.com\\\/?p=1143#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\\\/\\\/movingandmortgagehub.com\\\/wp-content\\\/uploads\\\/2026\\\/07\\\/df3ed82d595e3d6ef6211cddd54cbdbe.webp\",\"articleSection\":[\"Environment\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"CommentAction\",\"name\":\"Comment\",\"target\":[\"https:\\\/\\\/movingandmortgagehub.com\\\/?p=1143#respond\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/movingandmortgagehub.com\\\/?p=1143\",\"url\":\"https:\\\/\\\/movingandmortgagehub.com\\\/?p=1143\",\"name\":\"Oceans Are Absorbing Huge Amounts of Heat\u2014and Sending Some of It Ashore - 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