Nuclear power 'gets little public support worldwide'

French president clings to nuclear energy despite post-Fukushima fears, waste protests






PIERRELATTE, France — French President Nicolas Sarkozy said Friday it would be madness to reduce his country’s huge reliance on nuclear power, despite worldwide wariness after Japan’s Fukushima disaster and protests this week over the dangers of waste.

As countries — including neighboring Germany — renounce nuclear energy in the wake of the tsunami-triggered meltdown at the Fukushima nuclear plant earlier this year, France has remained a bastion of atomic power. France depends on it for three-quarters of its electricity, more than any other country.

Sarkozy, expected to run for re-election in April against a leftist who wants to shut down French reactors, argued that abandoning nuclear energy would destroy jobs and cost billions that France cannot afford as it strains to rein in debts and reduce unemployment at nearly 10 percent.

“We do not have the right to break with the political consensus of the last 65 years at the risk of destroying jobs in French industry. It’s madness,” the conservative president told workers at a glass factory in southern France. He said reducing nuclear power would be a “catastrophe.”

He spoke as German...

Sarkozy Gaining Ground in French Election Race, Poll Shows
November 22, 2011, 7:17 AM EST

By Gregory Viscusi

Nov. 22 (Bloomberg) -- The French presidential race between Francois Hollande and the incumbent, Nicolas Sarkozy, is narrowing, a poll showed.

Socialist Party candidate Hollande would defeat President Sarkozy 58 percent to 42 percent if the second round of next year’s elections were held now, the BVA poll said.

Hollande led 61 percent to 39 percent in the previous poll 10 days earlier, and 64 percent to 36 percent in October.

In the first round of elections, Hollande would take 32 percent, Sarkozy 27 percent, and anti-immigrant campaigner Marine Le Pen 18 percent. Under the French system, a run-off is held if no one gets a majority in the first round.

In the previous poll...