could remain uninhabitable for decades. [ 49 ] By March 2012, one year after the disaster, all but two of Japan's nuclear reactors had been shut down; some were damaged by the quake and tsunami. Authority to restart the others after scheduled maintenance throughout the year was given to local governments, and in all cases local opposition prevented restarting. According to The Japan Times , the Fukushima nuclear disaster changed the national debate over energy policy almost overnight. "By shattering the government's long-pitched safety myth about nuclear power, the crisis dramatically raised public awareness about energy use and sparked strong anti-nuclear sentiment". [ 50 ] After the Three Mile Island accident ( United States ) in 1979, there was a referendum in Sweden about the future of nuclear power there. As a result of this, the Swedish parliament decided in 1980 that no further nuclear power plants should be built, and that a nuclear power phase-out should be completed by 2010. Some observers [ who? ] have condemned the referendum as flawed because people could only vote "NO to nuclear", although three options were basically a harder or a softer "NO". [ citation needed ] After the 1986 Chernobyl accident in Ukraine , the question of security of nuclear energy was again raised. In 1997, the Riksdag , the Swedish parliament, decided to shut down one of the reactors at Barsebäck by July 1, 1998, and the second before July 1, 2001, although under the condition that their energy production