Porn for Catalunya - Language lessons may never be the same again after the Catalan regional government decided to fund a series of blue movies, deeming them useful for spreading the Catalan (ahem) tongue. The grants of €15,000 to a local film maker are for what he described as women-friendly erotic films.

The actors embark on numerous sexual adventures, including those of a "religious, faithful and hardworking" middle-class girl who has regular weekly meetings with a stranger and is introduced to, among numerous other things, lesbian sex. The movies are marketed as "erotic films for women", with male director Conrad Son claiming that one, about a male executive, is "for women who want to understand us".

Both Son, a separatist sympathiser whose website boasts that he offers "sex in Catalan", and the regional government claim the films are not pornography. Son has argued that as an experienced producer of pornographic films he was well placed to judge whether they had gone over the limit. The existence of plotlines and the "non-explicit" nature of the sex scenes meant they were artistic rather than pornographic, he said.

Spain’s conservative ABC newspaper accused Catalonia’s Socialist-led coalition government and the separatist Catalan Republican Left party (ERC) of sinking to new depths. "To publicly fund pornographic films ... borders on misappropriation of taxpayers’ money," it said.

Separatist politicians backed the Catalan filmmaker. "Any normal language is able to penetrate the most obscure places," Josep-Lluís Carod-Rovira, the ERC leader, told ABC. At Mosca Mansions we can hardly wait for Debbie does Denia…

Driving due to lemons?

The orange groves of Valencia could soon be powering Spanish cars as a new technology is developed to turn the fruit’s thick, shiny peel into biofuel. In a region with 190,000 hectares covered with oranges and lemons - many of which are left to rot on the trees - citric-powered cars could reduce pollution while using a readily available source of energy, according to local officials.

The presence of a Ford car factory in the town of Almussafes adds to the potential for the region. "We have a car plant ... and we have the oranges," explained Esteban González, head of planning at the regional government of Valencia.

Oranges and lemons have been cultivated along the east coast since at least the 18th century and are still the region’s biggest export product. Valencia produces 4m tonnes of oranges a year, most of which are squeezed into juice. Most of the 240,000 tonnes of waste is sold as animal feed but it could be turned into bioethanol. Each tonne of pulp could more than fill the average car’s petrol tank, producing 80 litres of fuel.

Valencia plans to utilise the technology being developed in another orange-growing region of the world, Florida. A distribution network around the Valencia region would sell the fuel to locals, who would pay about 40% less per litre than they pay for petrol.

The bioethanol project will not just use up pulp left over from juicing; it could also cope with much of the fruit that farmers leave on trees where it is no longer profitable to harvest them. And it’ll be fun asking for three bags of lemons at your local Repsol station in a few years time.

Casas Caros!

Spain has the second most expensive homes in Europe, a study claims. After London, Madrid is the city with the most expensive real estate. A study by three different property agencies in Britain, Germany and Spain found a luxury house with seven bedrooms, a garden and a swimming pool in Chelsea costs €8.1m. A similar property in Madrid with 600 sqm space and five bedrooms costs €5.4m.

In Spain, Barcelona and Valencia have the most costly homes after Madrid. The report was based on the sale of homes in Barcelona, Madrid, Valencia, London, Liverpool, Manchester, Munich, Hamburg and Berlin. You could probably buy most of Liverpool with €8.1m…

Spanish Speed!

The Provincial Court in Burgos has overturned a six month jail sentence and two year driving ban against a man, Constantino García Suárez , who had been driving down a local motorway at 260 kph

The judge considered that a dangerous driving charge did not apply. The judge admitted that the speed did reduce the driver’s reaction time and was an obvious danger, he had to take into account that there was no ‘concrete danger to anyone’. No one had to make an evasive manoeuvre, he said.

The driver was clocked in his Audi A-8 by a radar trap doing 260 kph on a straight. Must have had Vodka and orange juice in the tank…