The news that Britain’s police forces are turning to a dash of cooking oil to power their squad cars may smack of a budgetary squeeze gone mad, but it is far from that. The police are prepared to put up with being called the “frying” squad, and to take all the jokes about driving around in mobile chip shops for good reason. The biodiesel being used by them and other enlightened motorists is environmentally friendly. Made from a combination of traditional diesel and vegetable and rapeseed oil, some of it indeed recycled from chip shops, it can cut carbon dioxide emissions by up to 5%. Ironically, the police have taken their lead from those in south Wales who a couple of years ago powered their cars on cheap, unadulterated cooking oil from Asda.

The use of biodiesel (and bioethanol, which can be used instead of petrol) is an example of good environmental practice. Nobody notices when a car is chugging along on bio-fuel. There is not even a faint whiff of fried potatoes. Everybody does notice, on the other hand, when somebody builds a wind farm in an area of unspoilt and beautiful countryside. This week the planning inquiry into the Whinash wind farm on the edge of the Lake District National Park will begin. Opponents include Lord Bragg and Sir Chris Bonington who rightly say that the farm, encompassing 27 400ft high wind turbines, will be a blot on the landscape visible for miles around. It amounts to no less than an “industrialisation of the countryside”. The plan for these giant towers is backed surprisingly by Friends of the Earth and Greenpeace.

Wind farms are the electricity pylons or open-cast mining of the 21st century. They are ugly and destructive of birdlife and their contribution to Britain’s energy needs is minimal. The solution to our relentless thirst for energy will mean much greater fuel efficiency (roll on the 300mpg car) and the development of more nuclear power stations with appropriate safeguards for the disposal of waste. There is a limited place for alternative sources, but it is difficult to see that there is anything very intelligent about the giant wind farms.