Ministers want to increase the amount of energy from low carbon sources by encouraging more nuclear power and overseeing a three-fold increase in energy generated from renewable sources -- from five to 15 percent -- by 2015.

"It is right that we consider how nuclear power can help to underpin the security of our energy supply without increasing our reliance on fossil fuels," Prime Minister Tony Blair said in an article in The Times newspaper Wednesday.

But John Sauven, director of environmental campaign group Greenpeace, said that building new nuclear power stations would "strangle the new, clean energy technologies of the investment and political support they need."

"Reaching for nuclear power to fight climate change is like an obese person taking up smoking to lose weight," he said.

"It's a dangerous and expensive distraction in the fight against global warming."

Britain currently has 12 nuclear sites, many built in the 1960s and 1970s, which generate about 25 percent of the country's electricity.

Ministers plan to allow the private sector to initiate, fund, construct and operate new nuclear power stations but it is not yet clear how many there would be or how much energy they would generate.

Trade and Industry Secretary Alistair Darling told lawmakers in the House of Commons that a final decision on future nuclear power plants would be taken later this year.

"We have reached the preliminary view that it would be in the public interest to allow energy companies to invest in nuclear power," he said.

"But before we make our decision we are consulting further."

The government gave the go-ahead for new nuclear power stations last July but in February, London's High Court ordered it back to the drawing board after ruling that its consultation on the issue had been "seriously flawed."

Final plans will be approved when current finance minister Gordon Brown, who also reportedly backs building more nuclear power stations, is prime minister. He is due to take over from Blair on June 27.

Brown's situation is likely to be complicated by the refusal of the Scottish National Party (SNP), which is heading the devolved government in Scotland, to allow new nuclear power stations to be built there.

The British government has pledged to set legally binding limits to cut carbon dioxide emissions by 26 to 32 percent by 2020 and 60 percent by 2050, against a 1990 baseline.

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