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Power link rerouted
Harry Potter fans redirected the GreenLink interconnector after complaining that the original route would desecrate the burial site of Dobby, a fictional elf, at Freshwater West in Pembrokeshire, Wales.
“hundreds of Harry Potter fans contacted the company in charge of the power line”
The GreenLink path was moved away from the ‘grave’ after “hundreds” of Harry Potter fans contacted the company in charge of the power line, and CEO James O’Reilly said the route would now travel under the site, leaving no visible impact on “Dobby’s grave.”
Euronews reported that a £430 million (€502m) Greenlink over-and-undersea cable project between Britain and Ireland was rerouted after fans pointed out it would disturb a memorial to Dobby the House Elf.
Euronews also said the 190km Greenlink high-voltage cable was supposed to be laid between County Wexford in Ireland and Freshwater West beach in Pembrokeshire, Wales, where Dobby’s death scene was filmed.
In the same coverage, project manager Simon Ludlam described getting “hundreds of calls” from furious Harry Potter fans and said planners rerouted the cable so they “wouldn’t go anymore into Dobby's grave.”
Voices and quotes
On The Claire Byrne Show, GreenLink CEO James O’Reilly said the fact that it was “Dobby’s grave” was “one of those considerations,” while he also insisted that there were “several reasons for the changed route.”
O’Reilly told the programme that the description “not entirely true” after a BBC headline said “Harry Potter fans forced diversion of UK-Ireland power link to avoid Dobby’s grave,” arguing the company was “more concerned with minimising the project’s impact on the local environment and the local community.”
In an interview on The Energy Revolution podcast, Simon Ludlam explained that he initially did not know who Dobby was, saying, “Dobby, who’s Dobby? I don’t know Dobby? He’s a fictitious character in a fictitious book, the whole thing is fictitious, what are you talking about?”
Ludlam later said the outcry was “very, very serious,” and he described going back to planners to reroute the cable so it would not go into the memorial.
Euronews added that the project went live in 2025 and can now power 380,000 homes, “Without desecrating Dobby's grave.”
Tourism and what’s next
The rerouted cable kept the memorial at Freshwater West in place, where fans erected a shrine and started leaving painted stones and socks as a tribute to Dobby the House Elf.
“The National Trust – Europe's largest conservation charity - agreed the shrine could remain in place in 2022”
Euronews said the National Trust agreed the shrine could remain in place in 2022, but had urged fans not to leave socks behind for environmental reasons.
The Times of India described how the revised route “quite close” to genuine Bronze Age archaeological remains, with planning documents citing archaeological trenches near the cable route containing the rim of an inverted pottery vessel believed to be a Bronze Age collared urn dating to around 1700-1500 BC.
Despite those archaeological concerns, Simon Ludlam said “A lot of people were very happy about that, and the project is now going (ahead) and Dobby’s happy,” framing the outcome as both a protection of the memorial and a continuation of the infrastructure work.
In the same reporting, tourism advocates highlighted the memorial’s role in attracting visitors to Pembrokeshire, where tourism is a major contributor to the local economy.