World Notes AUSTRIA

What's to be done with millions of gallons of wine spiked with antifreeze? The Austrian Ministry of Agriculture has wrestled with that question for more than a year since it seized several warehouses of white wine that vintners and dealers had illegally sweetened with diethylene glycol, an antifreeze component. Pouring the stuff into a river or out onto the ground would only poison the water table and outrage Austria's watchful environmentalists.

Now Toni Kahlbacher, a Kitzbuhel snowplow maker, seems to have found a use for the tainted tipple. Kahlbacher mixed the wine with road salt to produce a concoction that melts ice more effectively than salt alone. That should delight both Agriculture officials and the Ministry of Public Construction, which estimates that clearing winter roads will take a third less salt thanks to the polluted wine.