ROME -- Italy said yesterday that within five years it plans to resume building nuclear power plants, 20 years after a public referendum resoundingly banned nuclear power and led to the deactivation of all its reactors.
"By the end of this legislature, we will put down the foundation stone for the construction in our country of a group of new-generation nuclear plants," said Claudio Scajola, the minister of economic development. "An action plan to go back to nuclear power cannot be delayed anymore."
The change is a striking sign of the times, reflecting growing concern in many European countries about the rising price of oil, energy security and the warming effects of carbon emissions from fossil fuels. All these factors have combined to make once-scorned nuclear energy far more palatable.
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