Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi and French President Nicolas Sarkozy signed an agreement on February 24 in Rome to jointly develop “at least” four nuclear power stations on Italian territory.

The deal, which will strengthen energy ties between the two countries, is seen as part of Berlusconi’s conservative government’s plan to re-introduce nuclear power in Italy almost 22 years after it was banned in a referendum. “We need to wake up from our slumber, and adapt to a future of renewable energy and nuclear power,” Berlusconi said at a joint news conference with Sarkozy. “On our side (we) will have France which has made available its know-how, and which will allow us to save and to begin the construction of the power stations in an absolutely limited time,” Berlusconi added. Italy depends on foreign sources for 87 percent of its energy needs. Oil accounts for 43 percent and gas 36 percent of its energy use.

Sarkozy hailed the deal as “historic” and said France was prepared to offer its southern European neighbour “a limitless partnership” on nuclear energy. Italy, by most estimates, the world’s seventh largest economy, currently relies heavily on imports - mostly from Russia and Algeria - to meet its energy requirements. Part of the deal will involve the creation of a consortium involving Italian energy utility Enel and French power giant EdF. Enel is set to acquire a 12.5 percent share in France’s second European Pressurized Reactor (EPR), in addition to the 12.5 percent quota it already has in the country’s first modern EPR nuclear reactor. EdF would also lend it extensive nuclear know-how to ENEL for the construction of nuclear power plants in Italy by 2020.

Italians voted against having nuclear power stations on their country’s soil in November 1987, one year after the Chernobyl nuclear disaster in the Soviet Union. The country’s four nuclear plants operating at the time were shut down. But Berlusconi’s government has indicated the country aims to begin constructing nuclear power stations by 2013. Italian Economic Development Minister Claudio Scajola said in October that Italy made a “terrible mistake” in phasing out nuclear power, costing more than 50 billion Euro, counting direct and indirect costs.

Environmental group Greenpeace said in January that it had evidence that nuclear waste from the EPR would be up to seven times more hazardous than waste produced by existing nuclear reactors.