Germany will close its 17 nuclear power plants – which generate one-quarter of the country’s electricity – by 2022, following the partial nuclear meltdown at the Fukushima Daiichi plant in Japan in March.

In a high-risk move, accompanied by industry warnings about price rises, chancellor Angela Merkel committed Europe’s largest economy to doubling the amount of electricity from renewable sources to 35 per cent this decade.

Ms Merkel had previously decided to prolong the operating lives of Germany’s nuclear plants by 14 years to 2036. She described the policy U-turn on Monday as “a big challenge”, though one that could put Germany at the forefront of green technology. “We have the chance of becoming the first big industrial nation to make the switch to renewable energy,” she said after her Christian Union party and their Free Democrat coalition partners agreed a series of measures.