The project takes water from a series of intake weirs at Lake Matiri and pipes it through a 2.4 km long buried pipeline to a power station.

[1] The project was originally proposed by New Zealand Energy Limited, which applied for resource consent for a 4.6 MW station in August 2008.

[2] The scheme was opposed by environmentalists and kayakers some of whom were angry that the resource consents were not notified nationwide.

[3] The proposal was approved and it included a concession granted by the Department of Conservation to build structures on public land.

[5] Construction was delayed by a slip[6] and by the COVID-19 pandemic, and the scheme was finally commissioned in December 2020.