Efforts to wean us all off petroleum based transport fuels appear to be failing miserably, judging by the latest oil product delivery figures from the Department of Energy and Climate Change (DECC).
These show UK demand for diesel was just as high as ever in the third quarter of 2013, with a total of over 6.58bn litres delivered in the quarter - a 1.3% rise in deliveries compared to the same quarter in 2012.
Forecourt sales accounted for 4.31bn litres (+2.1%), while bulk deliveries amounted to 2.27bn litres (-0.1%).
Cumulatively, demand for diesel reached 19.36bn litres in the first three quarters of 2013, up around 2.3% on the 18.92bn litres recorded at the same point in 2012.
Ministers at the DECC will undoubtedly wish to fall on their swords over these figures; ministers at the Treasury, we suspect, can only be rejoicing.