Hundreds of homeowners in Tehran have reported unannounced water cuts across neighbourhoods. However, water industry officials insist the issue stems from planned overnight pressure reductions designed to curb urban leakage and allow reservoirs to refill, according to a report by ISNA.

Iran is now enduring its sixth consecutive year of drought, facing an unprecedentedly dry autumn with virtually no rainfall to date. The situation has pushed major cities, including Tehran, to the brink of a water crisis. Since the summer, authorities have implemented a policy of reducing water pressure across the capital.

With more than 200 days of drought, officials have begun drafting worst-case scenarios to cope with dwindling supplies. Following warnings about plummeting dam levels and the need for public restraint, Energy Minister Abbas Aliabadi recently cautioned that authorities might be forced to cut water pressure to zero on some nights. He urged citizens to keep emergency reserves in storage tanks. However, many residents say water has already been cut off without notice in parts of the city.

“Last night, from 11 p.m. to 6 a.m., the water was completely off without prior warning — my husband was stuck in the shower,” Zohreh, 53, from western Tehran, told bne IntelliNews.

Ehsan, 38, who lives in the south of the city, reported a similar experience: “We see severe drops in pressure in some evenings, and by midnight it’s totally gone,” he said, speaking with this agency.

In response to growing calls to address the problems, Isa Bozorgzadeh, spokesperson for Iran’s water industry, stated that pressure management is being conducted “with greater precision than before.” He added that any prolonged cut-offs should be followed up with local water and wastewater companies.

“What has been instructed by the Ministry of Energy,” he said, “is that pressure management, which was announced months ago, should be applied more strictly from midnight until morning.”

Bozorgzadeh hinted vaguely that if voluntary reductions fail to cut consumption by at least 10%, the ministry might be compelled to introduce “fairly distributed consumption control plans”, but did not elaborate on the details.

The remarks are widely interpreted as an early sign of rationing plans. Yet with shared meters in apartment blocks, how such measures would work in practice remains unclear, with growing public discontent now seen across different regions in the capital.

He stressed that “any planned consumption limits for Tehran residents will be announced in advance,” adding, “It is not the Ministry’s policy to catch people off guard.” For now, he said, there are no daytime restrictions in place, “but the future will have to decide for itself.”

According to official figures, Tehran’s five main dams have dropped to their lowest levels in decades, with some reaching dead storage and unable to meet the capital’s needs in the months ahead. Even normal winter rainfall, experts warn, would barely make a dent in the shortage.

President Masoud Pezeshkian recently warned that if the drought persists through late autumn, authorities may have no choice but to ration water, and if the dry spell continues beyond that, “the city may have to be evacuated.”

Much of Tehran’s scarce water supply is lost through leaky, ageing distribution networks, yet experts say short-term relief hinges on public cooperation.

Zahra, 23, a resident of Tehran, suggested that remote work could help ease demand: “Commuting means more washing and more showers; working from home would make a difference.”

Meanwhile, citizens have begun sharing water-saving tips online, encouraging each other to turn off taps while brushing teeth or washing dishes, and to cut down on shower time, small steps that, for now, may be the only buffer between the capital and a full-blown crisis.