In 1974 France did launch its huge nuclear reactor-building programme, dubbed the 'Plan Messmer', because:
France HAD TO DO SOMETHING about a huge energy crisis which was quickly unfolding, inducing massive strategic pressure.
Climate change triggered way (way!) less efforts.
There was NO OTHER WAY for France to reduce its dependency towards fossil fuels.
Industrial solar and wind (energy) didn't exist then, and hydraulic capacity was already nearly saturated in France
This programme was NOT MAJORLY DISRUPTING because the reactors aimed at producing more electricity: 150 TWh/year before the Messmer Plan, to 521 when it ended in 2002, they did not replace any existing equipment. Adding new equipment and developing a new sector (nuclear) is way more easy than replacing an existing one (ask Germany about coal...).
We now have to replace most fossil-fuel burning equipment.
Nuclearization plan was already running since 1957 (when a civilian reactor named "EDF1" was born, then put in service in 1963) and boosted by the "6e plan" (1971), mainly because coal reserves in France were vanishing: the 'Plan Messmer' was not started from scratch but boosted an already running one.
We now start nearly from scratch, as converting fossil-fuel burning equipment to electricity isn't easy.
France COULD to do so because this programme began when its heavy industry was powerful (it now is much weaker), and in a quite rich nation at the peak of a giant economic boost.
France now fights an economic crisis.
Nuclear WAS JUDGED ADEQUATE, even if some leaders understood that escaping a dependency towards oil by gaining another towards uranium is stupid (they already knew France had insufficient adequate deposits, and nowadays hasn't any), because their hope was to alleviate it thanks to industrialized breeder reactors (a huge French pertinent R&D project, dubbed "Superphénix", started in 1974) or to some other trick (obtaining uranium from seawater...).
All those hopes failed flat, and even now there is no satisfying industrial breeder nor equivalent trick.
The general public (not, arguably, at least some experts) was NOT AWARE OF MOST BURDENS (accidents and exposure to terrorism/war/murder-suicides..., proliferation, hot waste disposal, dependency towards uranium providers, difficult decommission...). Even aware citizens could not do anything because France was, then, even more under heavy dirigisme and centralization than it now is (this may be difficult to believe for those who only knows its present state...).
Accident happened since the 1970's (TMI, Chernobyl, Fukushima), proliferation is patent (Iran, North-Korea...), the burden of nuclear waste isn't solved (Finland and South-Korea are the sole nations already using a theoretically adequate long-term repository and it doesn't offer an adequate storage volume. France, the U.-K. and the U.S. are waiting for theirs), France and US dependency towards Russian-controlled uranium providers, as long as decommission nightmares (the U.-K. suffers) are now clear.
All this may have been fueled by proponents of another plan.
The Messmer Plan neglected dismantling and waste (the theoretically relevant project, called Cigéo, is not yet finished in 2024 and even its total cost remains uncertain...), this reflects its on the fly genesis.
Some claim that this Plan has reduced the price of electricity in France, however in this matter we have to think in total cost, therefore to also consider public money expenditure: in France the taxpayer pays a large part of the electricity. By some weird fortuitous coincidence(?) the launch of the Messmer Plan (1974) marked a sharp acceleration in the increase in compulsory tax levies.
Moreover to evaluate the real cost of nuclear power we have to wait until the last waste from the last dismantled power station has cooled. Before that, additional costs (accident, stray waste, dreadful dismantling, uranium embargo, etc.) remain possible.
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