Germany-Energy-Merkel
German Chancellor Angela Merkel on Monday stressed her determination to reverse a decision by the former government to phase out nuclear energy by 2021, news reports said.

Talking at a meeting of the Christian Democratic Union (CDU) and its Bavarian sister-party, the Christian Social Union (CSU), in the southern town of Erding, the head of the CDU called the policy of exiting nuclear energy "absolutely wrong."
She urged a rethinking of the decision which would mothball all of Germany's 17 atomic power plants.

Merkel made clear that nuclear energy could also help contribute to affordable energy prices.

The chancellor pointed out that Germany was the only country with safe nuclear plants, wanting to shut them down.

As part of a grand coalition agreement with its junior coalition partner, the Social Democrats (SPD), Merkel's CDU has agreed to back the gradual nuclear phase-out during this legislative period which is to end in the fall of 2009.

German nuclear power plants account for 26 percent of the nation's energy consumption.

Faced with the phase-out by 2021, Germany's atomic reactors are still working at full strength, having raised their electricity production in 2006.

German nuclear power plants generated 167.4 billion kilowatt hours of electricity in 2006, up from 163 billion kilowatt hours in 2005.