Decades after the Chernobyl disaster spewed radiation across Europe and turned Italy off nuclear power, Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni's government is laying the groundwork to bring it back as the country seeks to improve its energy security.
The government is counting on a new generation of Italians who see nuclear power as a source of low-carbon electricity, a tool to help fight climate change and a way to strengthen stable energy supplies amid shocks from the Ukraine and Iran wars.
It is betting that such support will blunt the opinions of Italians who lived through the 1986 nuclear accident, still view atomic energy through the lens of risk and disaster and twice rejected nuclear power in national referenda, experts say.
Next week, Parliament is expected to approve government-sponsored legislation establishing a legal framework for next-generation nuclear technologies.
The government would then have 12 months to draft implementing decrees covering reactor licensing, safety standards, waste management and siting.
