A $580 million cable moved for a house-elf's memorial.

A $580 million high-voltage cable running about 125 miles under the Irish Sea was rerouted at the Welsh coast to spare the grave of a fictional house-elf. Simon Ludlam, who managed the Greenlink interconnector, had never heard of Dobby. Then a BBC Wales segment aired showing where the cable would surface at Freshwater West in Pembrokeshire, and his firm's phones started ringing. "We got hundreds of calls, I mean, hundreds of calls," Ludlam told the Energy Revolution podcast. The exit point sat right where fans have built a memorial to the character, who dies in Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 1. People fly in from Italy and Australia to leave painted stones and socks. "He's a fictitious character in a fictitious book," Ludlam recalled saying. He was correct and it did not matter. The planners moved the surfacing point. Greenlink began commercial operation in early 2025, moving up to 500 megawatts between the Irish and British grids. The memorial is still on the beach.