Paraná–La Plata

Building an honest picture of the Paraná and Paraguay rivers within the wider La Plata system.

Focus countries: southern Brazil, Paraguay and Argentina. This first outline covers the Paraná–Paraguay drainage basin, not the entire La Plata system. Uruguay-basin and direct estuary/coastal catchments are not included in these initial rainfall and model feeds.

Model snapshot fetched 07 Nov 2026, 13:10 Sydney. No live monitoring or alerts are enabled by this page.

The basin, in context

Outline area: 2,646,303 km²

BasinATLAS / HydroATLAS · Linke et al. (2019), WWF. BasinATLAS v1.0 level03, simplified to 0.03° by Draw on a Map (2026), selected by River Monitor. CC BY 4.0. Geometry only; no environmental attribute columns. Approximate dam markers; north is up. Paraná–Paraguay drainage basin within the wider La Plata system; not the whole La Plata basin.

Satellite rainfall

IMERG over the basin

Basin-mean IMERG rainfall · mm / day
Provider observation date (daily period, not a local clock time)	mm / day
2026-11-01	3.34
2026-11-02	10.42
2026-11-03	3.15
2026-11-04	5.36
2026-11-05	7.88

IMERG V07 Late · retrieved 07 Nov 2026, 13:57 Sydney. Missing days are not zero.

Basin mean of 0.1° cell centres inside the polygon, using the existing IMERG mask and best-product ordering. New region: no climatology or flood thresholds have been established. This snapshot uses Late-product daily values for 1–5 November 2026. 6 November was not available at retrieval; no value is filled in.

NASA GPM IMERG. Reuses the existing IMERG basin-mask pipeline. Raw responses and missing-data records stay in the private archive; no training tables are changed.

Modelled, not measured

GloFAS: forecast, unvalidated

GloFAS model snapshot · m³/s
Model daily periods (start 11:00 Sydney; provider UTC days)	m³/s
2026-11-07	19,905.72
2026-11-08	20,463.44
2026-11-09	21,280.40
2026-11-10	21,329.45
2026-11-11	19,141.56
2026-11-12	17,377.00
2026-11-13	16,633.14

Largest mean discharge among up to 49 cells within ±0.15° of the configured dam point; exploratory mainstem selection, not locally validated. Provider default GloFAS seamless product, future daily periods only. Cell -25.575, -54.625.

Copernicus Emergency Management Service GloFAS data via Open-Meteo, CC BY 4.0. Selected grid cells are not locally validated and do not represent dam-operator release schedules. Retrieval time is not a model issue time.

Copernicus EMS GloFAS · Open-Meteo Flood API. Keyless access used for local preview research only; production service terms need review before publication.

Dams in this first view

Approximate dam locations, not reservoir level readings
Dam	Countries	Latitude, longitude
Itaipú	Brazil / Paraguay	-25.408, -54.589
Yacyretá	Paraguay / Argentina	-27.482, -56.735

What we watch

Understand the dams, not just the dots

Capacity here means nameplate hydroelectric generation, not live output, reservoir storage, water available today or a safe-release limit. We keep operators and managing entities distinct.

Itaipú

Installed generation capacity: 14,000 MW installed
Owner / managing entity and operator: Itaipu Binacional, the Brazil–Paraguay treaty entity. Administration is shared equally by the two governments through ENBPar and ANDE.

Paraná catchment rainfall, official gauge coverage and separately credited ONS verified flows. A model value is not an operator release instruction.

Sources: ENBPar: ownership and capacity

Yacyretá

Installed generation capacity: 3,200 MW installed in the main powerhouse (20 units)
Owner / managing entity and operator: Entidad Binacional Yacyretá (EBY), the Argentina–Paraguay binational entity.

Dated Paraná observations, upstream conditions and official notices. Capacity cited is for the main station, not unverified extensions.

Sources: EBY: main powerhouse capacity · EBY treaty and ownership

Forecast, unvalidated

A sanity check is not validation

ONS verified daily hydraulic data reports Itaipu inflow 18,977.5 m³/s and outflow 20,516.0 m³/s on provider date 2026-11-05. This is a separately credited observation, not an ANA gauge or a substitute for one.

We checked units and broad magnitude against the nearby model snapshot. Operator reporting periods, forecast dates and the selected downstream grid point do not match exactly; tributary inputs and regulation also matter. No forecast-skill score is calculated from this comparison.

Stage in centimetres cannot be compared directly with discharge in m³/s. We need colocated, clock-aligned discharge observations, an independent forecast archive and enough paired cases before claiming accuracy. Read the regional methods note →

Official Brazilian network

ANA gauge watchlist · recent readings pending

Credit: Agência Nacional de Águas e Saneamento Básico (ANA), SNIRH, and the station operators named by ANA. These five candidate stations cover separate systems: Paraná, Uruguay, and Jacuí–Guaíba. Uruguay is outside the current outline; Jacuí–Guaíba drains to the coast, not to the Paraná. No recent measurements were returned by the retired legacy service. Future raw telemetry is provisional. Gauge stage is relative to each local staff datum, not metres above sea level; do not compare stage values between stations.

UHE ITAIPU PORTO SÃO JOSÉ ANA 64575000

RIO PARANÁ · Inside the Paraná–Paraguay outline · operator ITAIPU · station inventory location -22.7181, -53.1767