Official warnings against evacuating Tehran due to water shortages… in this case

Bezeshkian said in a speech broadcast on state television, "If it doesn’t rain, we will have to start rationing water in Tehran between late November and early December"

Water shortage in Tehran

He added: "Even if we ration and it doesn’t rain by then, we will run out of water, and we will have to evacuate Tehran."It was not immediately clear how the capital would be evacuated.

Iran was generally affected by the decrease in rainfall rates, but the repercussions are more evident in Tehran, which has a population of more than 10 million people.

On Sunday, the director of the regional water company, Behzad Parsa, said in an interview with a media outlet, that there is enough water for only two weeks in the main reservoir that supplies Tehran.

Precipitation In Iran

Tasnim Agency reported that the level of rainfall this year reached 152 millimetres, a decrease of 40 percent compared to the average over 57 years.

The agency quoted Mohammad Reza Kavian Pour, head of the Water Research Institute, as saying that many provinces "It witnessed a decrease in rainfall by between 50 and 80 percent"

He pointed out that storage in the capital’s dams in the new water year, which began in late September, amounted to 250 million cubic metres, that is, about half of the 490 million cubic meters that were recorded in the water year 2023-2024.

The lowest level in decades

He said: "We have to prepare ourselves for a critical situation"At a time when the water level in the tanks supplying the capital dropped to the lowest level in decades, according to Mohsen Ardakani, General Director of the Tehran Water Company.

He stated to state television on Wednesday, "In the last six months, residents have saved 10 percent of their water consumption".

He added "If this number reaches 20 percent, we will be able to guarantee a stable water situation for a month or two, until the rains begin to fall."

Rainfall in Tehran

Rain and snow usually fall in Tehran during the winter months, and the sharp decrease in rainfall and the decrease in water flow from dams have exacerbated the crisis, at a time when Iran is witnessing one of the worst droughts in decades.

In recent months, water has been cut off from many Tehran neighborhoods, with the aim of saving on consumption, according to the media, and water has also been cut off regularly during the summer. Last.

In July and August, the Iranian government announced two days of holiday in Tehran to manage water and energy consumption, at a time when electricity was cut off almost daily in the midst of the heat wave.