How electricity systems across Latin America can strengthen preparedness for El Niño

Hydropower plays a central role in electricity systems across Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC), accounting for more than half of the average annual electricity generation in countries such as Brazil, Colombia, Costa Rica, Ecuador, Panama, Paraguay and Peru. Hydropower supports the region’s electricity security by providing dispatchable and flexible generation, while its low marginal costs help maintain affordable electricity supply across the continent.

At the same time, hydropower’s availability and generation patterns are highly sensitive to variations in precipitation and temperature. As a result, many electricity systems in the region are particularly exposed to climate and weather conditions, including the El Niño-Southern Oscillation (ENSO). For several hydropower-dependent countries, El Niño conditions are frequently associated with below-average rainfall, which reduces inflows to reservoirs and limits hydropower generation. This has ramifications for power systems more broadly, boosting generation from thermal power plants during periods of hydrological stress. For example, during the 2023-2024 El Niño event, reservoir levels in Colombia fell to less than 30% of their average levels by April 2024, and demand for natural gas in the power sector almost doubled.

The 2026-2027 El Niño event is expected to be among the strongest since 1950. While many countries have already taken important steps to strengthen electricity security by diversifying their generation portfolios, severe climate-related events such as El Niño can still place significant stress on electricity systems. Against this backdrop, this commentary explores how emergency preparedness in the electricity sector can be strengthened, with experience from countries in Latin America, the Caribbean and beyond highlighting the importance of clear governance arrangements, access to emergency-response measures, long-term resilience planning, and mechanisms for testing and continuously improving preparedness frameworks. Taken together, these elements can help countries better anticipate, manage and recover from periods of weather-related disruptions.

The El Niño-Southern Oscillation is a coupled ocean-atmosphere phenomenon that occurs every two to seven years and alternates between three phases: El Niño, La Niña and a neutral state. The El Niño phase is characterised by warmer-than-average sea surface temperatures in the central and eastern tropical Pacific Ocean. By altering global atmospheric circulation, it produces different effects across Latin America and the Caribbean. In some areas, it brings below-average rainfall and higher temperatures, which can constrain hydropower generation, while increasing electricity demand for cooling and reducing the efficiency of thermal plants. Elsewhere, El Niño can bring unusually high levels of precipitation, causing rivers to overflow and heightening risks to hydropower infrastructure. While reduced reservoir inflows are typically the main concern in systems that depend on hydropower, excessive rainfall and flooding can also disrupt hydro operations and damage electricity infrastructure – as illustrated by landslides linked to El Niño in 2017, which led to the shutdown of the Callahuanca hydropower plant in Peru.

Weather-related events have resulted in a large degree of variation in hydropower’s share of electricity generation across Latin America and the Caribbean. Between 2015 and 2025, the annual share of hydropower in electricity generation fluctuated by up to 20 percentage points in Ecuador, 17 points in Panama and 10 points in Colombia, driven in part by weather patterns.

El Niño conditions started to materialise in the region in June 2026 and are likely to persist through spring 2027. Forecasts suggest the event could strengthen between October and December of this year, with weather forecasts for October already pointing to below-average precipitation across parts of northern South America, including areas of Bolivia, Colombia, Ecuador, Peru and Venezuela. Similar conditions are expected in parts of Central America and the Caribbean, including Belize, the Dominican Republic, and areas of Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras and Panama. Brazil is expected to experience below-average rainfall in the north and above-average rainfall in the south; drier conditions in the north could affect water availability for hydropower plants there, including the 3.6-GW Santo Antônio hydropower plant, which suspended operations for two weeks due to low inflows during the 2023-2024 El Niño event. Forecasts also point to above-average rainfall in some parts of Mexico and the coasts of Ecuador and Peru, the centre and southern coast of Chile, Paraguay, Uruguay, and the centre and south of Argentina.

While countries across the region have accumulated significant experience in managing hydrological stress due to El Niño and other climate-related risks, preparedness measures are often focused on specific events, rather than embedded within specific and comprehensive risk-management frameworks. With climate-related disruptions likely to become more frequent and severe, there is increasing value in adopting a systematic approach to assessing and strengthening emergency preparedness for the electricity sector.

The IEA's analytical work on electricity security and climate resilience, its specialised Electricity Security Taskforce, and more than five decades of experience reviewing oil emergency response arrangements point to four areas that are important for ensuring electricity systems are prepared to manage climate-related risks. These include risk governance and preparedness; emergency response capabilities and short-term measures; long-term resilience and adaptation planning; and testing, learning and continuous improvement. Together, these elements provide a practical framework for assessing preparedness and strengthening the resilience of electricity systems before, during and after climate-related disruptions such as El Niño.

Clear institutional arrangements are a key element of preparing for electricity security risks, helping to define the respective roles and responsibilities of energy ministries, regulators, transmission and distribution system operators, market operators, generators, utilities and disaster management agencies. They are often complemented by mechanisms to support coordination before a crisis occurs, including communication protocols, formal coordination procedures and dedicated emergency committees.

These governance arrangements can be crucial during periods of system stress. In many jurisdictions, dedicated emergency coordination structures, such as operational response handbooks, provide a basis for clarifying institutional responsibilities before a disruption occurs. By establishing procedures for sharing information, making decisions and handling any crisis escalation, these arrangements can facilitate coordination during emergencies and help reduce reliance on ad hoc responses should system conditions deteriorate.

Several countries in the region have already established important elements of such arrangements. Costa Rica's National Strategy for El Niño and its associated monitoring platform support coordination among institutions responsible for managing climate-related risks. For the 2023-2024 event, Peru and Colombia developed national and multi-sectoral plans to prepare for and respond to El Niño, helping clarify institutional responsibilities and coordinate actions across government entities. Extending such institutional arrangements more systematically across the region could strengthen the foundations for timely, coordinated and efficient responses.

When climate-related risks such as El Niño begin tightening supply-demand balances in electricity systems, countries need access to a well-defined set of emergency measures that can be activated rapidly to safeguard supply. The availability of a predefined toolkit of response measures can support timely decision-making by reducing the need to develop new interventions for each contingency. Such toolkits can also provide flexibility by offering a range of operational, regulatory and demand-side options that can be deployed according to the nature, scale and duration of the disruption.

These measures may include emergency electricity imports; demand-response programmes; public energy-saving campaigns; accelerated maintenance programmes of power plants; the use of backup thermal generation, supported by adequate domestic fuel supplies; fuel-switching capabilities in thermal plants; and other operational actions aimed at ensuring a stable electricity supply.

There are already several examples of such measures across the region. During recent periods of hydrological stress, Costa Rica combined reservoir monitoring with contingency planning, energy-saving campaigns and participation in the Central American regional electricity market. Brazil brought forward power generation capacity to strengthen electricity supply security by advancing when five contracted power plants could begin operations. Colombia expanded regional electricity exchanges and introduced public sector electricity-saving measures, while also leveraging other programmes aimed at managing demand. As with the demand-restraint measures maintained by IEA Members for oil emergencies, these measures are most effective when they are defined, tested and ready to be activated before a disruption occurs, rather than developed in response to a crisis.

Over the longer term, improving system resilience requires structural measures that reduce its vulnerability to future El Niño events. Electricity sector preparedness should therefore be closely linked to long-term planning processes aimed at reducing exposure to future disruptions. Integrating climate considerations into electricity sector planning can help ensure future investments are better adapted to variable weather patterns and evolving climate risks.

Key actions may include measures to address supply adequacy risks, such as expanding regional interconnections, diversifying electricity generation portfolios, improving long-term energy storage capacity, and ensuring the availability of dispatchable resources during periods of hydrological stress. Addressing network constraints may also require prioritising the efficiency and expansion of transmission infrastructure. Integrating climate information into planning and investment decisions can also improve system-wide efficiency.

Several countries in the region are already pursuing measures that contribute to long-term resilience. Brazil, Chile and Colombia have accelerated the deployment of solar and wind generation, helping diversify electricity supply and reduce dependence on hydrological conditions. Similarly, Ecuador, Honduras and Peru have announced investments in network reinforcement, additional capacity and other infrastructure improvements aimed at strengthening system reliability. The region has also continued to advance initiatives to integrate its electricity systems, which can help make better use of complementary renewable resources, improve system flexibility and provide additional support during periods of weather-related stress. During the 2023-2024 El Niño event, Costa Rica and Nicaragua purchased electricity through the Central American Regional Electricity Market (SIEPAC), illustrating how such regional interconnections can support electricity security when domestic supply conditions deteriorate. While this experience highlights the benefits of regional cooperation, integration remains a largely untapped opportunity across Latin America and the Caribbean. Initiatives such as the Andean Electrical Interconnection System (SINEA), SIESUR across the Southern Cone, and ARCONORTE – each of which cover different regions of South America – provide a foundation for deeper integration and resilience in the future.

The effectiveness of preparedness plans is closely linked to regular testing and updates. One of the most important lessons from the IEA's work on oil emergency preparedness is that exercises and simulations play a critical role in strengthening institutional readiness and crisis management capabilities.

Scenario exercises allow governments, regulators, system operators and utilities to test coordination arrangements, communication procedures and emergency-response measures under realistic conditions. They can help identify bottlenecks, clarify institutional responsibilities and reveal gaps before a real emergency occurs. Regular training programmes, simulation exercises and post-event evaluations also help organisations build institutional memory and improve decision-making during periods of stress.

In Latin America and the Caribbean, some countries already participate in regional simulation exercises as part of broader efforts to manage disaster risks. For example, the Central American Integration System (SICA), through the Coordination Centre for the Prevention of Disasters in Central America and the Dominican Republic (CEPREDENAC), organises regional exercises that test emergency procedures, institutional coordination and cross-border response arrangements in the face of events such as landslides, earthquakes and floods. Such exercises provide an opportunity to identify preparedness gaps, strengthen coordination and share knowledge among participating institutions.

Lessons from exercises and real-world events should then be systematically incorporated into planning instruments, regulations and operational procedures to ensure that preparedness arrangements evolve as risks change over time.

Boosting preparedness across these four areas should not be undertaken through stand-alone initiatives. Rather, these pillars highlight key elements that countries may wish to incorporate into existing electricity sector legislation, regulations, planning instruments and operational procedures. While institutional arrangements will differ from country to country, experience suggests that preparedness is most effective when governance arrangements, emergency-response measures, long-term resilience planning and mechanisms for continuous improvement are considered together.

International experience provides useful references. Under the European Union’s regulation on risk preparedness in the electricity sector, countries are required to assess electricity security risks, establish risk-preparedness plans, define management procedures for an electricity crisis, and regularly review preparedness arrangements based on experience implementing them. All European Union countries have developed dedicated risk-preparedness plans for their electricity sectors under this framework. Meanwhile, India's Disaster Management Plan for the Power Sector integrates preparedness, response, recovery and institutional learning within a single strategic document.

Building on the considerable experience and progress already achieved across Latin America and the Caribbean, the regular assessment of preparedness arrangements can help identify gaps, strengthen resilience and enhance electricity security in the face of El Niño and other weather-related risks. The IEA stands ready to work with governments and regional organisations in strengthening emergency preparedness through analysis, peer learning, emergency response exercises, the sharing of international experience and capacity-building activities, with support tailored to national circumstances and priorities.

This commentary benefited from the contributions of Marc Casanovas Simo (Energy Analyst), Federico Callioni (Energy Efficiency Policy Analyst), Hugh Hopewell (Senior Energy Analyst) and Alexandre Bizeul (Statistics Team Lead)