Iran faces unprecedented drought as water crisis hits Tehran

Iran – especially its capital, Tehran – is facing an unprecedented drought this fall, with rainfall falling to record levels and water tanks almost empty. Officials are calling on citizens to conserve water as the crisis worsens.

President Masoud Pezeshkian warned that if enough rain does not fall soon, Tehran’s water supply may be rationed. But he said that even legalization may not be enough to prevent disaster.

“If legalization does not work, we may have to evacuate Tehran,” Pezeshkian said.

His comments sparked criticism in Iranian newspapers and on social media. Former Tehran Mayor Gholam Hossein Karbashi described the idea as a “joke” and said that “evacuating Tehran does not make sense at all.”

Iranian meteorological officials say no rain is expected during the next 10 days.

Meanwhile, the water crisis is already affecting daily life in the capital.

“I plan to buy water tanks to use for toilets and other necessities,” a woman in Tehran told BBC Persian.

In the summer, Iranian rapper Fafa Ahmadpour posted a video on social media showing a kitchen faucet without running water.

“It’s been four or five hours,” he said. “I bought bottled water just so I could go to the toilet.”

The director of Latian Dam, one of Tehran’s main water sources, says it now contains less than 10% of its capacity. The nearby Karaj Dam – which supplies water to Tehran and Alborz provinces – is in a similarly dire state.

“I have never seen this dam so empty since I was born,” an elderly local resident told Iranian state television.

According to Muhammad Ali Moallem, director of Karaj Dam, rainfall has decreased significantly.

“Rainfall has decreased by 92% compared to last year,” he said. “We only have eight percent of the water in our reservoir – most of it is unusable and considered ‘dead water’.”

The government is now pinning its hopes on rains in late autumn, but the outlook is bleak. Iranian Energy Minister Abbas Aliabadi warned that the situation may soon force the authorities to cut off water supplies.

“Some nights we may reduce the water flow to zero,” he said.

Officials also announced plans to penalize households and businesses that consume excessive amounts of water.

Iranian Energy Minister Ali Ebadi said that the water crisis in Tehran is not only due to lack of rainfall. He blamed water leaks caused by the capital’s century-old water infrastructure and even pointed to the recent 12-day war with Israel.

During that conflict, Israel targeted the Tajrish neighborhood north of Tehran on June 15. Videos then showed heavy flooding in the area.

The day after the attack, the Israeli military said it targeted Iranian military “command centers.”

But the crisis extends beyond the capital.

The head of Iran’s National Center for Climate and Drought Crisis Management, Ahmad Vazifa, warned that, except for Tehran, dams in several other provinces – including West Azerbaijan, East Azerbaijan and Central – are also in a “worrying state”, with water levels reaching single-digit percentages.

In Mashhad, Iran’s second-largest city, officials also sounded the alarm.

The governor of Khorasan Razavi Province, northeastern Iran, said that the water reserves in Mashhad’s dams had fallen to “less than eight percent,” warning that the province was facing “a major challenge from drought.”

The CEO of the Water and Sanitation Company in Mashhad put the number even lower.

Hossein Ismailian said, “The storage level in the city’s main dam is less than three percent.”

“Only three percent of the total capacity of Mashhad’s four water supply dams – Torog, Kardeh, Dosti and Ardak – is left. Apart from Dosti Dam, the other three are out of service.”

Iran’s water crisis has been decades in the making.

Even Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, has repeatedly acknowledged the looming threat — speaking about water shortages in his Nowruz speeches in 2011 and on other occasions in the years since.

However, little has changed.

Today, Tehran, Karaj and Mashhad – home to more than 16 million people combined – face the real possibility of their taps running out of water.