The power station is situated on the Great Lake and South Esk and is owned and operated by Hydro Tasmania.

Water leaves the power station via a roughly 4-kilometre (2.5 mi) long tailrace tunnel and discharges into the Macquarie River via Brumbies Rivulet.

The small construction village of Poatina sits perched on top of a low plateau, 3.5 kilometres (2.2 mi) from the stations subterranean location.

The station output, estimated at 1,255 gigawatt-hours (4,520 TJ) annually,[1] is fed via underground circuit breakers to two 16 kV/110 kV and four 16 kV/220 kV generator transformers located in the switchyard above,[4] and then to TasNetworks' transmission grid at the Palmerston Substation 4-kilometre (2.5 mi) to the east.

[6][7] The Poatina output in early 2016 had dropped to one-fifth of capacity due to ongoing water shortage in Tasmania's hydro system.