The popular tourist venture faced closure due to volatile electricity costs and lower than targeted water levels, which forced Hydro to limit its flows into the King River to the afternoon. 

The limited flows meant King River Rafting faced a bill of thousands of dollars for Hydro to open the gates in the morning.

But following Tuesday’s meeting in Hobart business owner Michele Steane confirmed an agreement had been reached with the state government and Hydro.

“We are very relieved – King River Rafting lives on,” she beamed.

The business will change its booking system and reduce its operation to seven days each fortnight.  Mrs Steane acknowledged the compromise would have a negative effect on the business’ revenue. 

“It will to a certain extent but it will lock in boats on the busier days,” she said. 

“What we’re doing at this point is having a trial of this and we’ll have a meeting with them [Hydro] at the end of the season in April.”

The business will not pay Hydro Tasmania a lump sum for using its water flows – instead paying a per-head fee after the completion of trips.

“We were looking at not existing so this has been a great outcome,” she said. 

“We have many bookings – about seven or eight waiting to be done because we haven’t put them through in the last couple of days because of the uncertainty.”

Minister for Energy Matthew Groom said the agreement would provide King River Rafting with a number of rafting trips per season as part of an agreed water release program.

“Last year reinforced the importance of carefully managing Hydro’s water storages, but if water is used for generation on a regular basis, then we should put it to good use and helping King River Rafting is an example of that.

King River Rafting return to King River on February 7. Due to falling temperatures, the last trip for the season will be on April 4. There were concerns that tourism to the West Coast  could take a hit if the business had to shut.