Brace for a ‘blowtorch winter’: Super El Niño threatens Canadian gas producers and provincial coffers

An unusually warm weather pattern building in the Pacific Ocean is expected to give North America its mildest winter in modern memory, potentially cutting natural gas heating demand and squeezing revenues for producers and royalties for gas-producing provinces.

“Get ready for a blowtorch winter,” said Matt Rogers, president of Commodity Weather Group, on a call with clients.

Over the course of his decades-long career, Rogers has seen only three Super El Niños. “And the one developing in the Pacific right now will be the strongest yet.”

Rogers first tracked a Super El Niño in the 1997-98 winter. The next was in 2015-16, nicknamed Godzilla, because it was even stronger.

The stakes reach well beyond the weather. A mild winter could cut natural gas prices by as much as a third leaving Canadian producers and provincial governments exposed during the months when revenue and royalties usually peak.

An El Niño is a climate pattern characterized by above average sea surface temperatures in the Pacific Ocean. “Their cause is related to the geology of the Pacific and a roughly three to seven-year cycle in trade-wind behaviour,” Rogers said in an interview.

Normally, trade winds sweep westward across the Pacific, piling up warm surface water near Asia and Australia while cold, nutrient-rich water wells up along the South American coast.

A Super El Niño winter is certainly a risk and would definitely impact AECO prices

In an El Niño year, those winds slacken or even reverse, letting a massive pool of warm water build up across the central Pacific. An El Niño becomes “super” when there’s a temperature change of two degrees Celsius or higher.

This year, waters in the central equatorial Pacific, the key El Niño monitoring zone, are running five to six degrees above normal. And forecasters expect the El Niño to keep strengthening through November and December before weakening in the first half of 2027.