The French and the US reasons are, from what I understand, quite different. I don't know the US situation that well.
In France, many factors were involved:
* France over-producing power for decades around y2k, which meant it was hard to commit the country to build more nuclear reactors.
* The EPR being an over-engineered fiasco due to it being designed in a Franco-German partnership which quickly folded, but the design was kept.
* The privatization of the energy sector involved a lot of restructuring for EDF, and the creation of Areva. This had a lot of involvement, but the main one is that the state took a hands-off stance, and EDF and Areva started competing with each other rather than collaborating.
* Areva got mismanaged quite heavily. People like to point out the Olkiluoto fiasco, but what really killed the company was the Uramin scandal.
* Politicians since 2007 started asking hefty dividends from public companies, involving EDF, in order to prop up the government's budget. That created an investment deficit, and significant debt for EDF.
So yeah, lots of things, but the underlying issue seems to be that France used to have a culture of the state coordinating huge projects, which was lost with the new generation of politicians. There seems to be an appetite for new reactors, but the industry is significantly harmed by 20 years of political mixed signals, and whether the current politicians and the industry can deliver remains unclear.
In France, many factors were involved:
* France over-producing power for decades around y2k, which meant it was hard to commit the country to build more nuclear reactors.
* The EPR being an over-engineered fiasco due to it being designed in a Franco-German partnership which quickly folded, but the design was kept.
* The privatization of the energy sector involved a lot of restructuring for EDF, and the creation of Areva. This had a lot of involvement, but the main one is that the state took a hands-off stance, and EDF and Areva started competing with each other rather than collaborating.
* Areva got mismanaged quite heavily. People like to point out the Olkiluoto fiasco, but what really killed the company was the Uramin scandal.
* Politicians since 2007 started asking hefty dividends from public companies, involving EDF, in order to prop up the government's budget. That created an investment deficit, and significant debt for EDF.
So yeah, lots of things, but the underlying issue seems to be that France used to have a culture of the state coordinating huge projects, which was lost with the new generation of politicians. There seems to be an appetite for new reactors, but the industry is significantly harmed by 20 years of political mixed signals, and whether the current politicians and the industry can deliver remains unclear.