https://www.pbssocal.org/news-community/l-a-s-long-troubled-...
It is only very recently that California started trying to decarbonize.
When France did their amazing nuclear build, it was for energy independence, not for decarbonization purposes. It was a very forward thinking move, even if it wasn't as cheap initially imagined and ended up being stopped before fully completed. It was a national security project.
However nuclear is cheap when the high upfront capital costs have been paid off, and it's down to just the operating expenses. Building it is oppressively expensive, however, especially as labor costs have risen in the many decades since the 1970s while.
As France's nuclear fleet ages out and needs to be replaced, it seems unlikely that they will be able to pull off a build of a second fleet. Their efforts at prototyping the next design, the EPR, have been fairly disastrous, with builds at Flamanville and in Finland going very poorly.
I suspect that Germany & California's current route to decarbonization through renewables will be followed by France in the coming decades.