The know-how seems to have been lost though. The latest nuclear power plant they've tried to build (the Flamanville EPR) is severely late, and the budget has ballooned to several times the initial estimation.
it is only late because the managers insisted on marketing and building it on 5 years while the engineers knew that it would be 10 years from the beginning. Pretty sure most people here know this exact situation from their job :-)
That being said all I know about the project comes from the news on the French radio... What new regulations are you talking about?