The Pantanal region in South America is one of the world's largest wetlands. Since 2019, the Pantanal has suffered a prolonged drought that has spelled disaster for the region, and subsequent fires have engulfed hundreds of thousands of hectares. The lack of rainfall during the summers of 2019 and 2020 was caused by reduced transport of warm and humid summer air from Amazonia into the Pantanal. Instead, a predominance of warmer and drier air masses from subtropical latitudes contributed to a scarcity of summer rainfall at the peak of the monsoon season. This led to prolonged extreme drought conditions across the region. This drought had severe impacts on the hydrology of the Pantanal. Hydrometric levels fell all along the Paraguay River. In 2020, river levels reached extremely low values, and in some sections of this river, transportation had to be restricted. Very low river levels affected the mobility of people and shipping of soybeans and minerals to the Atlantic Ocean by the Hidrovia -Paraná-Paraguai (Paraná-Paraguay Waterway). This study is directed to better understand the hydroclimatic aspects of the current drought in the Brazilian Pantanal and their impacts on natural and human systems. As a consequence of the drought, fires spread and affected natural biodiversity as well as the agribusiness and cattle ranching sectors. While fires had serious socioecological and economic consequences, we do not intend to investigate the effect of the downstream low-level waters on the Pantanal ecosystems or the drought in the risk of fire.

Drought-related disasters are among the natural disasters that are able to cause large economic and social losses. In recent years, droughts have affected different regions of Brazil, impacting water, food, and energy security. In this study, we used the Integrated Drought Index (IDI), which combines a meteorological-based drought index and remote sensing-based index, to assess the drought events from 2011 to 2019 over Brazil. During this period, drought events were observed throughout the country, being most severe and widespread between the years 2011 and 2017. In most of the country, the 2014/15 hydrological year stands out due to the higher occurrence of severe and moderate droughts. However, drought intensity and observed impacts were different for each region, which is shown by the different case studies, assessing different types of impacts caused by drought in Brazil. Thus, it is fundamental to evaluate the impacts of droughts in a continental country such as Brazil, where a variety of vegetation, soil, land use, and especially different climate regimes predominate.

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Southeastern Brazil is characterized by seasonal rainfall variability. This can have a great social, economic, and environmental impact due to both excessive and deficient water availability. During 2014 and 2015, the region experienced one of the most severe droughts since 1960. The resulting water crisis has seriously affected water supply to the metropolitan region of São Paulo and hydroelectric power generation throughout the entire country. This research considered the upstream basins of the southeastern Brazilian reservoirs Cantareira (2,279 km 2 ; water supply) and Emborcação (29,076 km 2 ), Três Marias (51,576 km 2 ), Furnas (52,197 km 2 ), and Mascarenhas (71,649 km 2 ; hydropower) for hydrological modelling. It made the first attempt at configuring a season-based probability-distributed model (PDM-CEMADEN) for simulating different hydrological processes during wet and dry seasons. The model successfully reproduced the intra-annual and interannual variability of the upstream inflows during 1985-2015. The performance of the model was very satisfactory not only during the wet, dry, and transitional seasons separately but also during the whole period. The best performance was obtained for the upstream basin of Furnas, as it had the highest quality daily precipitation and potential evapotranspiration data. The Nash-Sutcliffe efficiency and logarithmic Nash-Sutcliffe efficiency were 0.92 and 0.93 for the calibration period 1984-2001, 0.87 and 0.88 for the validation period 2001-2010, and 0.93 and 0.90 for the validation period 2010-2015, respectively. Results indicated that during the wet season, the upstream basins have a larger capacity and variation of soil water storage, a larger soil water conductivity, and quicker surface water flow than during the dry season. The added complexity of configuring a season-based PDM-CEMADEN relative to the traditional model is well justified by its capacity to better reproduce initial conditions for hydrological forecasting and prediction. The PDM-CEMADEN is a simple, efficient, and easy-touse model, and it will facilitate early decision making and implement adaptation measures relating to disaster prevention for reservoirs with large-sized upstream basins. KEYWORDS 2014/2015 water crisis, intra-annual and interannual rainfall variability, PDM-CEMADEN, seasonal calibration, southeastern Brazil

Embora eventos de secas sejam menos frequentes na Região Sul, se comparado com outras regiões do Brasil, quando ocorrem impactam o abastecimento de água, produção agrícola e a geração de energia elétrica. Portanto, a avaliação dos impactos da seca no setor agrícola e nos recursos hídricos, são de extrema importância para a gestão de riscos nesta região. Neste estudo avaliou-se os principais eventos de secas e seus impactos entre 1998 a 2020 (maio) na Região Sul do Brasil. Para isto, foram utilizados índices de secas calculados a partir de dados de precipitação, vazão e dados derivados de satélite. De acordo com o Índice de Precipitação Padronizada (SPI), o evento mais severo de seca ocorreu no estado do Paraná em 2006. Como consequência, registrou-se valores de área agro-produtivas afetada acima de 80% e seca hidrológica excepcional na bacia hidrográfica afluente (BHA) à usina hidrelétrica (UHE) Segredo, segundo o Índice de Vazão Padronizada (SSFI), além de vazões afluentes abaixo do percentil 90 durante 50% do ano. Em Santa Catarina e no Rio Grande do Sul, os eventos de secas de maior severidade ocorreram em 2012/2013. Apesar disso, os percentuais de áreas agro-produtivas afetadas foram inferiores aos verificados para 2019/2020. Com relação aos recursos hídricos, o SSFI indicou seca excepcional na BHA ao reservatório da UHE Passo Real, e foi observada vazão abaixo do percentil 90 no primeiro semestre de 2012. No evento de seca 2019/2020, o primeiro trimestre de 2020 foi o mais crítico em termos de intensidade e expansão, como mostrado pelo Índice Integrado de Seca, em que 100% dos municípios de toda a região foram classificados em condição de seca. O impacto deste evento pode ser observado pelo SSFI da BHA ao reservatório da UHE Itaipu, com menores valores registrados a partir de janeiro de 2020. Este evento pode estar associado à influência da fase negativa da Oscilação Decadal do Pacífico e condições de neutralidade no Pacífico Equatorial.