Approval has been granted for a giant water licence in the Northern Territory. 

The Northern Territory Water Controller has granted a licence to Fortune Agribusiness, which is planning to develop a $150 million “nationally significant” cattle station that could extract up to 40,000 megalitres of groundwater per year. 

The application relates to Singleton Station, whose traditional owners had raised their opposition to the plan. 

However, NT Water Controller Jo Townsend laid out the approval of Singleton's groundwater licence in four stages.

The first stage allows the company to extract 12,788 ML/year for a period of two years from the approval date. 

However, if its fourth stage is approved, Singleton could extract 40,000 megalitres per year, making it the largest single water licence ever issued in the NT.

Ms Townsend says Fortune Agribusiness has to meet “certain milestones and management conditions prior to it proceeding to the next stage”.

“There is a lot of onus on the proponent to use the water as allocated and proceed in a staged way to ensure the water is used as it should be,” she told the ABC.

Fortune Agribusiness has to meet conditions relating to groundwater-dependent ecosystems and map out the entire station on foot before it can begin pumping.

“They need to prepare an adaptive management plan that outlines how they will change, say, their pumping regime or their bore structure, should there be outcomes they don't expect,” Ms Townsend said.

“They also need to do some salinity studies as well.”

The company is also waiting on land clearing permits, a non-pastoral use permit and a possible probe under the terms of the Environment Protection Act, before it can begin any horticultural development.

Ms Townsend said the government team did an “incredible amount of work” on the water licence approval.

“There is a new groundwater model here, there has been significant work to understand the cultural requirements and also the groundwater-dependent ecosystems in the area,” she said.

“But with any area that has not been widely developed there is uncertainty, and that's why this licence requires the proponent to do additional work before they can commence extraction.

“There are also triggers that will be in the management plan, so that should the water resource behave in a way that is not anticipated or modelled, there will be certain management action they will be required to take.”

The local land council is still opposed to the plan.