The unjustifiable part is the connection of this ban to any consequence. The assumption you try to pass off without justification is that without the ban, nuclear would have triumphed. But then you admitted this conclusion cannot be justified.

So, your pointing to the ban is just dishonestly trying to connect the dots without actually connecting any dots.

Me, I think the raw cost figures speak for themselves. Even if nuclear had not been banned, it would have failed, although perhaps lots of money would have been wasted trying to maintain the pretense it wasn't a failure.

> The assumption you try to pass off without justification is that without the ban, nuclear would have triumphed

I never said that, I said I think economics have little to do with the downfall of nuclear power. At least in most european countries, nuclear was banned or phased out for other reasons.

You said:

> I don't think fission is loosing because it's too expensive: it has acquired a reputation of being dangerous and it's probably too late to convience people otherwise, maybe younger generations.

That is, you are claiming that the CAUSE of nuclear's state is the public reaction, not economics. If nuclear would have failed anyway, how can that "because" be valid?

Nuclear seems to have worked out well for France over the last 50 years.

But not cost-effectively, afaik ?

It depends what you consider as costs. France power generation (and consumption as well) is one of the very few with reliably low carbon intensity. You can play around with https://app.electricitymaps.com/map and see how bad the emissions are in the rest of Europe.

So not cost-effectively in the universally understood meaning.

I think carbon should be taxed and the externality should be moved to balance sheets, but that's another discussion.

France didn't solve the problem of cost-effective nuclear power.