{
  "slug": "coral-bleaching-ocean-warming-attribution-2026",
  "title": "Ocean Warming Now Dominates El Nino in Coral Bleaching Attribution",
  "url": "https://solaranalytica.com/coral-bleaching-ocean-warming-attribution-2026",
  "summary": "A 2026 Oceanography study finds that removing anthropogenic warming drops 70 of 71 recently bleached coral regions below moderate risk, while warming now outweighs a strong El Nino in 71 of 74 dual-signal regions. The observed record, modelled counterfactual and SSP3-7.0 projection remain explicitly separated.",
  "license": "Free to use with attribution to Solar Analytica (solaranalytica.com). Underlying figures are named to their public sources below.",
  "csv": "https://solaranalytica.com/reports/coral-bleaching-ocean-warming-attribution-2026/data.csv",
  "datePublished": "2026-07-28",
  "lastReviewed": "2026-07-27",
  "sources": [
    {
      "title": "Pershing et al. (2026): Quantifying the Role of Climate Change in Driving Mass Coral Bleaching",
      "url": "https://doi.org/10.5670/oceanog.2026.e210"
    },
    {
      "title": "Pershing et al. (2026): Supplementary materials",
      "url": "https://tos.org/oceanography/assets/docs/39-2-pershing-supp.pdf"
    },
    {
      "title": "NOAA Coral Reef Watch: Current global bleaching event status",
      "url": "https://www.coralreefwatch.noaa.gov/satellite/research/coral_bleaching_report.php"
    },
    {
      "title": "NOAA NESDIS: World's fourth mass coral bleaching event likely ended in 2025",
      "url": "https://www.nesdis.noaa.gov/news/worlds-fourth-mass-coral-bleaching-event-likely-ended-2025"
    },
    {
      "title": "NOAA NCEI: Optimum Interpolation Sea Surface Temperature",
      "url": "https://www.ncei.noaa.gov/products/optimum-interpolation-sst"
    },
    {
      "title": "Met Office Hadley Centre: HadCRUT5",
      "url": "https://www.metoffice.gov.uk/hadobs/hadcrut5/"
    },
    {
      "title": "Spady et al. (2026): Global coral bleaching event observations, 2018 to 2025",
      "url": "https://doi.org/10.1007/s00338-025-02810-x"
    }
  ],
  "figures": [
    {
      "id": "warming-dominance-over-strong-el-nino",
      "title": "Regions where the warming contribution exceeds a strong El Nino",
      "unit": "per cent of 74 dual-signal regions",
      "valueLabel": "Share of regions",
      "provenance": {
        "dataSource": "Pershing et al. (2026), Oceanography 39(2):12-16",
        "dataType": "Observation-led attribution with modelled counterfactuals",
        "scope": "MEOW coral regions represented by 1-degree ocean cells",
        "statistic": "Regional counts and shares reported in the paper",
        "interval": "No confidence interval reproduced for these count summaries"
      },
      "caption": "Pershing et al. (2026). The 1989, 1998 and 2025 rows are historical attribution results; 2028 is projected under SSP3-7.0.",
      "series": [
        {
          "label": "1989 crossover",
          "value": 50
        },
        {
          "label": "1998 event",
          "value": 82.43243243243244
        },
        {
          "label": "2025 study endpoint",
          "value": 95.94594594594594
        },
        {
          "label": "2028 SSP3-7.0 projection",
          "value": 100
        }
      ]
    },
    {
      "id": "recent-event-counterfactual-risk",
      "title": "Reported 2018 to 2025 regions below moderate risk in the counterfactual",
      "unit": "per cent of 71 reported regions",
      "valueLabel": "Below moderate risk",
      "provenance": {
        "dataSource": "Pershing et al. (2026), Oceanography 39(2):12-16",
        "dataType": "Observation-led attribution with modelled counterfactuals",
        "scope": "71 regions with reported bleaching in Spady et al. (2026), assessed in the counterfactual",
        "statistic": "Regional counts and shares reported in the paper",
        "interval": "No confidence interval reproduced for these count summaries"
      },
      "caption": "Pershing et al. (2026). Seventy of 71 reported regions fall below 4 degree-C weeks after removing the attributed anthropogenic warming contribution.",
      "series": [
        {
          "label": "Below moderate risk",
          "value": 98.59154929577466
        },
        {
          "label": "Moderate risk remains",
          "value": 1.408450704225345
        }
      ]
    }
  ]
}