The Westland District Council and representatives from a company called Alpine Pure have met to discuss permission for water from the iconic Mount Aspiring National Park to be shipped overseas.
Shipping New Zealand water internationally is a divisive topic at the moment, with Chinese company Nongfu looking to take millions more litres from Otakiri Springs in Bay of Plenty, virtually for free.
But there seemed to be little opposition to consent hearing discussions in Haast on the West Coast on Friday, when Alpine Pure proposed to build a water pipeline from Mount Aspiring National Park to Neils Beach.
The Mount Aspiring water would then be piped to waiting ships and sold overseas.
Westland Mayor Bruce Smith told RNZ there was very little concern from locals about the project at all.
"In fact, I'd go so far as to say none."
Mr Smith went on to say the project would bring both environmental and economic benefits to the West Coast region.
A decision to give consent to access land for the project would be made in the next three weeks.
Newshub asked Prime Minister Bill English about it on Saturday, but he told us he "didn't know anything about the proposal".
Mr English did comment on water use in general though, telling Newshub the Government may yet look at changing the rules over how it is sold.
"When it comes to paying for water, everyone's a bit sensitive about it, but we're working through how we can adjust our system for using water so that we can maintain the quality and people feel like it's getting the best use and part of our clean, green environment.
"We want to maintain and improve the quality of our water. We want to make sure people say it as part of their birth right in New Zealand, and there's some pretty trick issues as to who should pay for what, but we're looking into all those.
"There's been five or six years of work on just understanding where our water resources are, what their quality is, who pays for what, and we have the opportunity over the next few years to change those rules if we want to."
Newshub.
