My take is that the French government wants to have a nuclear industry to share the costs with the military side. Thus subsidizing nuclear submarines, carriers

My take is that the French government wants to have a nuclear industry to share the costs with the military side. Thus subsidizing nuclear submarines, carriers and nuclear weapons while keeping a skilled industry to base it on. To allow this the population get subsidized electricity, and everyone else can read about the amazingly cheap electricity in France even though it's a pure subsidy. In 2010, as part of the progressive liberalisation of the energy market under EU directives, France agreed the Accès régulé à l'électricité nucléaire historique (ARENH) regulations that allowed third party suppliers access up to about a quarter of France's pre-2011 nuclear generation capacity, at a fixed price of €42/MWh from 1 July 2011 until 31 December 2025.[57][58][59] > As of 2015, France's household electricity price, excluding taxation, is the 12th cheapest amongst the 28 member European Union and the second-cheapest to industrial consumers.[60] The actual cost of generating electricity by nuclear power is not published by EDF or the French government but is estimated to be between €59/MWh and €83/MWh.[61] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_power_in_France https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_power_in_France