Shipping: Will El Niño Further Disrupt Cargo Flows? in Hellenic Shipping News 08/06/2026 T his year’s El Niño could bring more cargo flow shifts. In a recent weekly report, shipbroker Intermodal said that “El Niño is again becoming a factor for 2026, and its freight impact is likely to be felt mainly through Asian power demand, crop risk and trade-flow shifts. The latest probability set points to El Niño emerging in May–July with an 82% probability and lasting through winter 2026/27 with a 96% probability. The important point for shipping is timing; this is developing into the Northern Hemisphere summer, when Asian power demand, Indian monsoon risk, Pacific weather disruption and grain-crop formation all start to matter at the same time”. Source: Intermodal According to Intermodal’s Head of Research Department, Mr. Yiannis Parganas, “for dry bulk, the first channel is coal. India’s peak power demand has already reached 270.73 GW, above the government’s summer expectation of 270 GW, after four consecutive days of record demand. Coal still accounts for more than 70% of Indian power generation, so a hotter and drier summer does not need to create a structural energy deficit to affect freight. It only needs to extend the call on coal-fired generation and slow the rebuilding of domestic stocks. That supports incremental imports into India, mainly Indonesia, Australia and South Africa, and helps absorb Panamax/Kamsarmax supply in the Indian Ocean and Pacific”. “The second channel is China and North Asia. Asian thermal coal imports are forecast at 76.26 million tonnes in May, up 23% from April and above last year’s May level. China’s seaborne arrivals are projected at 22.63 million tonnes, while India is expected at 13.78 million tonnes. Part of this is unrelated to weather, including softer Chinese domestic output and Indonesian policy uncertainty, but El Niño adds demand-side persistence if heat raises cooling load and hydropower availability weakens. This is supportive