The Itaipu plant is located in a trinational region, with an estimated population of 700 thousand inhabitants.

The periodic maintenance works for the safety of the Itaipu dam are recognized by other plants for their excellence in the periodicity of monitoring their structures, the technical qualification of the professionals involved and the level of detail of the criteria to be studied to guarantee the multiple uses of the its reservoir.

The safety conditions of the dam are constantly verified by regular inspections, seismic monitoring, with thousands of instruments installed throughout the dam. Audits are carried out by a group of high level civilian consultants every 4 years who apply the best techniques of study, sharing of experiences and information for the maintenance of the existing structures.

Since it is a run-of-the-river hydroelectric plant, that is, without a sensitive capacity to change of the level of the water in its reservoir, Itaipu has a reduced damping capacity of the floods, so it is necessary to open the spillway so that the waters follow their natural course along the river, occasionally affecting some communities downstream, such as the San Rafael neighborhood in Paraguayan territory, located approximately 12 kilometers from the plant.

The Binational Emergency Action Plan has a Flood Commission, which monitors the hydrological situation and defines the operational plan in situations of risk. The Committee is concerned with the safety of the dam and also with the effects that the meteorological phenomena can cause to the populations, keeping the responsible public bodies in Brazil and Paraguay updated on the hydrological conditions, in order to facilitate and anticipate possible evacuations of the population in areas previously mapped.

In 2017, two floods of small proportions occurred in the Paraná river, that did not come to affect houses in Brazil and Paraguay. On the two occasions, Itaipu issued hydrological warning bulletins informing daily the current and future water levels of the Paraná River, which allowed effective work of entities related to the civil defense of the two countries.