A major UK energy project was redirected after Harry Potter fans said it would pass through the ‘grave’ of the fictional elf Dobby, it has emerged.

Freshwater West beach in Pembrokeshire was set to host the £430million Greenlink interconnector to carry solar and wind power between Ireland and the UK but the plans caused uproar among fans of the JK Rowling book series. 

After his death in the seventh and final book, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, the title character buries the elf in the beach’s dunes.

When fans heard of the pipeline plan, they protested to the project’s bosses, who consulted with planners to reroute the cable around the ‘grave’.

Speaking on The Energy Revolution podcast, the project’s former director Simon Ludlam said his team received ‘hundreds’ of calls from Harry Potter fans after he was interviewed by BBC Wales about the pipeline.

Mr Ludlam, who was project director between 2017 and 2019, said after agreement was reached on the cable’s route, he gave an interview explaining in ‘great graphic detail’ how the underground link would go ‘up into the dunes’ on the beach.

After his words aired Mr Ludlam, who also led Etchea Energy, which advised on the project, said his team was inundated with calls from people concerned the cable was ‘going straight through Dobby’s grave’.

Mr Ludlam said he initially asked ‘who’s Dobby?’ before being told it was a ‘very, very serious matter’.

A major energy project was rerouted after fans of the Harry Potter series protested a pipeline would run through the grave of a fictional elf

In the final instalment of the series, the boy wizard buries the elf on Freshwater West beach in Pembrokeshire

Simon Ludlam, the project’s former director, said his team received ‘hundreds’ of calls complaining about the pipeline’s planned route

Despite being ‘super busy’ the director said he was told: ‘We really have to respond to this.’

In the Harry Potter series, Dobby is a house elf who serves the Malfoy family and was fatally wounded by a knife while trying to rescue the eponymous wizard.

Before dying the elf teleported himself and Harry to Shell Cottage on Freshwater West beach, where the wizard digs him a grave.

The Greenlink interconnector opened in April last year and has a capacity of 504MW, enough to power 380,000 homes.

It runs 190km (118 miles) from the National Grid’s substation in Pembroke to EirGrid’s Great Island location in Co. Wexford in Ireland’s south-east.

One of the first privately-funded energy infrastructure projects of its kind in Europe, bosses said the link would reduce prices after opening.

A memorial to Dobby at the beach attracts thousands of visitors annually and is decorated with painted stones and socks, which can ‘free’ elves from servitude in the JK Rowling series

The £430million Greenlink interconnector ran from Co.Wexford in Ireland to Pembrokeshire in Wales and opened last year

Dobby’s ‘grave’ has been under threat in recent years, though a consultation in 2022 said a memorial for the fictitious elf could remain on the beach ‘in the immediate term’.

National Trust Wales investigated the memorial after concerns over high visitor numbers – more than 75,000 a year at the time of the consultation – and pollution but said it did not need to be removed.

Mr Ludlam did not say when the uproar over the Greenlink pipeline took place.

The beach is a legally protected conservation area, home to wildlife including lizards, orchids and rare ground-nesting birds.

Nearby there are large grey seals, harbour porpoise and some of the largest seabird populations in the world.

The Daily Mail contacted Etchea Energy for comment.