WANA (May 18) – The old man opened the window to draw the scent of the heavy spring rain into the house. His wife, with a smile of relief, said, “Haji, look at that rain! It seems that this year, there’s no sign of last year’s miseries and water outages.”

 

The old man glanced at the sky, but unlike his wife, his smile was somewhat bitter; he still remembered the image of last summer and the neighborhood’s multi-hour water cuts, which, under the heavy shadow of drought, had exhausted his patience.

 

Public Perception vs. Hydrological Reality

In these spring days, heavy downpours have breathed new life into Iranian cities, but in the Central Plateau, these precipitations often create a visual illusion.

 

While citizens are witnessing intense downpours, Isa Bozorgzadeh, the spokesperson for Iran’s water industry, says: “Iran’s entry into a pluvial period is absolutely untrue.” Tehran has now entered its sixth consecutive year of drought, a reality hidden behind the wet walls of the city.

An Iranian woman walks through rain in a flower market, ahead of Nowruz, the Iranian New Year, in Tehran, Iran March 16, 2023. Majid Asgaripour/WANA (West Asia News Agency)

An Iranian woman walks through rain in a flower market, ahead of Nowruz, the Iranian New Year, in Tehran, Iran, March 16, 2023. Majid Asgaripour/WANA (West Asia News Agency)

Thunder and the Sound of War

These precipitations were accompanied by an atmosphere of military tensions and global theories. During the recent 40-day battle of Iran (the war that the U.S. and Israel started against Iran), when strategic radars in the region were targeted, strange rumors took shape in cyberspace.

 

Some Iranian and foreign users, pointing to the high volume of rainfall or the overflowing of certain dams in Iraq, Turkey, and Iran, claimed that Iran’s destruction of American radars had prevented the activity of the secret “HAARP” project, thereby bringing the rain back to the region.

 

HAARP is the world’s most powerful “ionospheric heater” station and an American project that sends high-frequency radio waves hundreds of kilometers above the Earth. The ionosphere is the highest layer of the atmosphere, consisting of charged particles, and is considered the boundary between Earth and space.

 

Although websites such as NewsTreason have described HAARP as a program with specific agendas, experts believe that these waves only target the upper layers of the atmosphere.

The intensity of the thunder heard during the recent war was so severe that people in Tehran and many other Iranian cities repeatedly mistook it for the sound of explosions or the roar of fighter jets.

 

In response to this wave of rumors, the Iran Meteorological Organization issued an official statement, explicitly declaring that meteorological and military radars do not have the capability or possibility to alter the climate, or to decrease or increase precipitation on a meteorological scale.

 

The Water-Energy Nexus: A Dual Crisis

The water crisis in Iran goes beyond thirst; it is an energy crisis. A large portion of Iran’s power grid depends on hydroelectric power plants, and empty dams mean summertime darkness. According to statistics released by the spokesperson for Iran’s water industry:

 

National Reservoir Average: Although the average filling rate of the country’s dam reservoirs has reached 66% (equivalent to 34 billion and 230 million cubic meters), which shows a 26% growth compared to last year, the distribution of these precipitations is highly unbalanced.

A general view of the Amirkabir dam following a drought crisis in Tehran, Iran, November 11, 2025. Majid Asgaripour/WANA (West Asia News Agency)

The Lar Dam and the Capital’s Crisis: The Lar Dam, as a vital source for the capital, is operating at only 6% of its capacity.

 

Negative Reserves of Tehran and Qom: In densely populated and strategic regions such as Tehran, the average filling rate of dams is only 23% to 24%, and these two provinces rank at the top of the entire country with a 32% rainfall deficit compared to the 57-year long-term average.

 

Concentration of Low Rainfall: Following the capital, the provinces of Markazi, Yazd, Qazvin, Isfahan, Semnan, Alborz, Gilan, Mazandaran, Sistan and Baluchestan, Chaharmahal and Bakhtiari, and Ardabil have also experienced a 10% to 22% decrease in rainfall compared to the long-term average; to the extent that the lowest amount of rainfall in the entire country was recorded in Yazd province at only 70 mm.

 

National Tension: Even though the country’s total average rainfall (227 mm) has grown by 61% compared to last year thanks to the downpours, 35 million people of the country’s population still remain seriously exposed to low rainfall and water scarcity due to the concentration of low rainfall in densely populated areas (such as Tehran, Alborz, Mashhad, Arak, Saveh, and Hamedan), which could also trigger widespread power outages.

A carpenter works following a power outage at a carpentry workshop in Tehran

A carpenter works following a power outage at a carpentry workshop in Tehran, Iran, June 1, 2025. Majid Asgaripour/WANA (West Asia News Agency)

Undoubtedly, the water crisis in Iran goes beyond the scarcity of natural resources and stems from the mismanagement of consumption and improper use of this vital commodity.

 

A major portion of water consumption in the country, particularly in the agricultural sector, is carried out inefficiently and at high cost, while even in the domestic sector, many subscribers exhibit high-consumption and damaging behaviors due to cultural or economic reasons or a lack of effective supervision.

 

Resilience Solutions

Last summer, people turned to water tankers and storage tanks to meet their needs. Alongside emergency projects such as transferring water from the Taleqan Dam, consumption management solutions like installing water-saving devices have yielded tangible results.

 

Esmaeil Mohseni-Nasab—the Deputy for Subscriber Affairs of the Water and Wastewater Company of Tehran Province—has also recently pointed to the results of implementing the water-saving device installation project in certain residential complexes, stating:

 

“In a 20-unit complex, the average water consumption per unit before the implementation of the project was 16 cubic meters per month, which, after the implementation of consumption management measures, decreased to 10.8 cubic meters per month for each unit.”

People shop for water storage tanks following a drought crisis in Tehran, Iran, November 10, 2025. Majid Asgaripour/WANA (West Asia News Agency)

These successes indicate that reducing equipment and economic management, like a 30% discount for low consumers, is effective. However, with increasing water scarcity and land subsidence, experts stress that water saving alone isn’t enough. The saved resources should be used to restore underground aquifers through watershed management and aquifer reclamation projects.

 

The story of water in Iran is the intersection of fleeting downpours and structural droughts. Spring downpours may wash the dust off the streets, but they do not fill the empty reservoirs of dams.

 

For a country whose energy security depends on the drops behind dams, the smart management of consumption across all sectors—from citizens’ conservation to structural reforms in agriculture and industry—is the most vital step to escape the recurring nightmare of tankers and blackouts.