French energy minister Eric Besson has said the closure of the France’s oldest nuclear power plant at Fessenheim would be “extremely prejudicial to the electric security” of the country.

He was speaking last night following news at the weekend that France's Green party had made a pact with the Socialist party to close 24 of the country’s 58 nuclear reactors by 2025 if the left wins presidential elections next spring. The agreement stated that the first to be shut down would be Fessenheim.

Besson said France’s security of power supply depended “above all” on the preservation of the country’s nuclear base.

Fessenheim was commissioned in 1977 and is located 1.5 km from the border with Germany.