ROME — Italy said Thursday it would begin building nuclear power stations to reduce dependence on oil and gas, scrapping a 1987 decision by referendum that rejected atomic energy.
"During the term of this parliament we will lay the first stone for the construction in our country of a group of new-generation nuclear power stations," Economic Development Minister Claudia Scajola told the Italian employers' federation Confindustria.
"We can no longer avoid an action plan for a return to nuclear power," he said, recalling a campaign pledge by Italy's newly named right-wing prime minister, Silvio Berlusconi, to take such a step.
A decision to renounce nuclear power generation and to close the country's four nuclear plants was taken by referendum in 1987 following the nuclear disaster in Chernobyl, Ukraine on April 26, 1986.
But according to Confindustria head Emma Marcegaglia the time has now come "to invest in nuclear energy" as the country has become too dependent on foreign energy sources.
Following the Confindustria meeting Fulvio Conti, head of Italy's principal power group Enel, said his company was "technically ready" to take part in the initiative, the Ansa news agency reported.
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