On 3 September 2026 the World Meteorological Organization issued its most unequivocal El Ni\u00f1o update to date. The event is already established and is forecast to intensify to a very strong event, peaking towards the end of 2026, with a likelihood of nearly 100% that it persists through to February 2027. WMO has issued a complementary Global Seasonal Climate Update and has asked climate-sensitive sectors to prepare.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n WMO is careful to note that the strength of an El Ni\u00f1o does not by itself determine how severe its effects will be in any one region. Nobody can tell you today how many named storms will cross Ireland and the UK between now and February. What the update does tell you is that the coming winter carries elevated uncertainty, and that planning for disruption is the responsible position.<\/p>\n\n\n\n For sites with environmental monitoring obligations, that planning has a specific focus.<\/p>\n\n\n\n A storm night will produce high noise and dust readings. That is expected. An exceedance recorded during a red weather warning, with the wind data alongside it, is an explainable event. The record shows what happened, when, and why.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The greater compliance risk is the period during which nothing was recorded at all.<\/p>\n\n\n\n A monitoring condition attached to a planning permission, licence or contract is a requirement to demonstrate compliance, not simply to be compliant. Demonstration needs a record. If the monitor was down from Friday evening until a technician reached site on Monday, there is no record for that period. The site cannot show retrospectively that boundary limits were met, and it cannot show that they were not. In practice, an absence of evidence tends to be read against the site rather than in its favour. A complaint received during a gap has nothing to answer it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Winter compounds this. Storms arrive outside working hours. Access roads flood. Site power is cut and restored without anyone present. Each of those is a plausible start to a multi-day gap in the record.<\/p>\n\n\n\n <\/p>\n\n\n\n The DM30N Sitesens is built for unattended boundary monitoring, and its behaviour under power interruption is designed around this problem.<\/p>\n\n\n\n When power is lost and then restored, the Sitesens resumes measurement automatically. There is no manual restart, no reconfiguration and no site visit required to get the record running again. Measurement begins on power-up in the same way it did on first installation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n If a site does go down, the performance monitoring layer in Sonitus Cloud checks that each measurement site is reporting on schedule. If it stops reporting, an email alert is issued so the team knows about the outage while it is happening rather than discovering it in the monthly report.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The unit accepts 110\u2013240V AC or 12V DC input, which gives options for battery or backup supply where site power is known to be unreliable. Operating range is \u201310\u00b0C to 50\u00b0C and 0% to 95% RH. The heated inlet removes moisture from the sampled air, which matters in the wet, foggy conditions that follow a winter storm and which would otherwise register as particulate.<\/p>\n\n\n\n <\/p>\n\n\n\n Readings upload to Sonitus Cloud automatically every 15 minutes over the built-in 3G\/4G modem or over Wi-Fi. The SIM and data costs are included in the annual service. Readings are also stored on the device, with capacity for more than three years at five-minute logging intervals, so a loss of network does not mean a loss of data. When the connection returns, the stored readings follow.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The result is a continuous record: noise and particulate levels, temperature, humidity and, where the wind sensor upgrade is fitted, wind speed and direction. That combined record is what allows a storm-night exceedance to be understood and explained.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Before the first named storm:<\/p>\n\n\n\n If you have monitoring obligations running through the winter and want to check your setup before the season starts, contact the Sonitus Systems team at info@sonitussystems.com<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Measure. Monitor. Protect.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Continuity of Evidence: Environmental Monitoring Through an El Ni\u00f1o Winter On 3 September 2026 the World Meteorological Organization issued its most unequivocal El Ni\u00f1o update to date. The event is already established and is forecast to intensify to a very strong event, peaking towards the end of 2026, with a likelihood of nearly 100% that …<\/p>\nUnderstanding the Risk<\/h4>\n\n\n\n
What the equipment does when power goes off<\/h4>\n\n\n\n
What happens to the data<\/h4>\n\n\n\n
Pre-winter checklist<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
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Talk to us<\/h4>\n\n\n\n