Geldof calls for more nuclear power

LONDON - Anti-poverty campaigner Bob Geldof joined the global warming debate on Thursday with a call for the rapid expansion of nuclear power, describing renewable energy as a "Mickey Mouse" answer to the climate crisis.

The former rock star, known for his campaigning on poverty relief in Africa, was writing on a blog set up by carmaker Lexus to promote hybrid road vehicles.

"The reality is that we need to do much more than change the type of car we drive to make an impact on climate change. In the UK, we'll soon have to scramble for more nuclear power," Geldof wrote.

"On this issue, I don't care what anyone says: we're going to go with it, big-time. We may mess around with wind and waves and other renewable energy sources, trying to make them sustainable, but they're not. They're Mickey Mouse," he added.

The comments are unlikely to endear him to the environmental lobby which condemns nuclear power as dirty, dangerous and expensive.

For its part the nuclear power industry says it is at least part of the answer to global warming caused by emissions of carbon gases from burning fossil fuels for power and transport.

United Nations environment ministers meeting in Indonesia are split over the guidelines for starting two years of formal negotiations on a deal to succeed the Kyoto Protocol, a U.N. pact capping greenhouse gas emissions of all industrial nations except the United States until 2012.