Former PM Juppe returns as Sarkozy's green supremo

By Francois Murphy

PARIS (Reuters) - Banned from holding elected office three years ago, former prime minister Alain Juppe completed a remarkable comeback on Friday when he took over a powerful superministry to become France's "green supremo."

Juppe, a long-time ally of former president Jacques Chirac, was put in charge of environment, energy and transport policies by newly installed President Nicolas Sarkozy and will also be the number two in the streamlined government.

As premier, Juppe pushed without success in the mid-1990s for bold reforms to France's generous pension system, prompting strikes and sending his popularity ratings to all-time lows.

Worse followed in 2004 when a court banned him from holding elected office for 10 years for his role in a party financing scandal centered on Paris City Hall in the 1980s and early 1990s.

The ban was reduced to one year a few months later which enabled the 61-year-old to return to politics last year.

His high-profile appointment makes good on Sarkozy's campaign pledge to make the environment a top priority.

In a brief speech after his nomination, Juppe said he would work on preparing wide-ranging talks with green organizations and other groups on measures to protect the environment.

Sarkozy calls the negotiations, scheduled for the autumn, an environmental version of the ground-breaking 'Grenelle' talks of 1968 in which the government, unions and employers agreed to widespread reforms to put an end to strikes.

"I am aware of the difficulty and the size of the task that awaits us," Juppe said.

"It is a large project and a project that starts immediately because the president has set us the objective of organizing a Grenelle of the environment in September or October," he added.

Sarkozy's office said in a statement the new president would meet environmental non-governmental organizations on Monday as part of the preparations for the conference.

"The expectations of the public are great and the will is great at the summit of the state," Juppe said.

The environment became a major electoral theme early in the campaign, when hugely popular television star and environmental activist Nicolas Hulot urged candidates to sign up to a green manifesto or risk facing him at the ballot box.

Most signed up, including Sarkozy, and he did not run.

"Here at least we are in a situation where we can work and things are being approached in a serious way by bringing together all the economic, social partners (employers and unions), NGOs," Hulot told France Info radio on Friday.

(Additional reporting by Emmanuel Jarry and Elizabeth Pineau)