NIAMEY (Reuters) – Niger will push ahead with a plan to develop civilian nuclear energy in partnership with other West African peers despite recent accidents including Fukushima, the country’s president said on Monday. Its key partner is French nuclear giant Areva, whose Imouraren mine should turn Niger into the world’s No. 2 producer/exporter of uranium.
“We have said that in the long term, we will promote, as part of ECOWAS (the West African regional bloc), civilian nuclear energy,” President Mahamadou Issoufou told a international forum on youths and green jobs in the capital Niamey.
“The Chernobyl accident and recently Fukushima can not make us abandon this choice, especially with regard to the ongoing efforts to establish international standards for the construction of nuclear power,” Issoufou said. ”In addition to renewable energy, nuclear energy is clean and low cost.”
Source: Reuters
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