Europe split over safety of power plants

AUSTRIA has called for European nuclear power plants to face stress tests to reassure people worried by the crisis in Japan, while Britain and France have urged calm.

Nuclear power has been poised for a revival as Europe strives to cut climate-warming carbon emissions and gas imports, but public mistrust still runs high, with the Chernobyl accident in 1986 still strong in many Europeans’ minds.

Public confidence in the industry looks set to fall, as Japan scrambled to avert a meltdown at a stricken nuclear plant days after an earthquake and tsunami.