Fukushima Anniversary to be Marked by Protests, Rallies, Flash Mobs Across the US and Entire World

WASHINGTON - From Alabama to Wisconsin, Vermont to California and across the world, the first anniversary of the Fukushima nuclear disaster will be marked by protests, rallies, flashmobs and other actions from the growing movement for a nuclear-free, carbon-free energy future.

NIRS has compiled a list of Fukushima anniversary actions in the U.S. here: http://www.nirs.org/action.htm. Local contacts and/or links are provided for the actions. Note that there is a link to a different page listing actions across the world, available in five languages.

The listed events include a wide variety of actions, from “die-ins” in several states to a mock “evacuation” of Vermont Yankee to rallies in California, New York and elsewhere. In Washington, DC, a goat named Katie, whose milk contained high levels of radioactivity when she lived near the Millstone Nuclear Power Plant in Connecticut and who has been stricken with inoperable cancer, takes her Farewell Tour to the White House on Sunday, March 11, at 12 noon.

“One year after the Fukushima accident began—an accident that still has not ended—at least 80,000 Japanese people have lost their homes and livelihoods. Hundreds of thousands more are living in contaminated zones and afraid, often for good reason, of the food they eat and water they drink. The nuclear industry and radiation deniers claim that no one has died because of Fukushima. That’s only because the cancers that are coming take more than one year to appear. While the nuclear industry appears determined not to learn any lessons from Fukushima, the public understands the lessons very well. And the most important lesson is that we must end the use of nuclear power and move as quickly as possible to clean and sustainable energy sources,” said Michael Mariotte, executive director of Nuclear Information and Resource Service.

A public opinion poll released this week by the Civil Society Institute indicates that U.S. opposition to nuclear power remains strong one year after Fukushima.

Among the findings of this poll:

• Nearly six in 10 Americans (57%) are less supportive of expanding nuclear power in the United States than they were before the Japanese reactor crisis, a nearly identical finding to the 58% who responded the same way when asked the same question one year ago. This contrasts sharply with pre-Fukushima surveys by Gallup and other organizations showing a 60 percent support level for nuclear power.

• More than three out of four Americans (77%) say they are now more supportive than they were a year ago "to using clean renewable energy resources  'such as wind and solar' and increased energy efficiency as an alternative to more nuclear power in the United States." This finding edged up from the 2011 survey level of 76%.

• More than three out of four Americans (77%) would support "a shift of federal loan-guarantee support for energy away from nuclear reactors" in favor of wind and solar power. This level of support was up from the 74% finding in the 2011 survey.

• In response to a new question in the 2012 survey, more than six in 10 Americans (61%) said they were less supportive of nuclear power as a result of reports in the U.S. during 2011 and so far in 2012 of nuclear reactors that had to be shut down due such factors as natural disasters, equipment failure and radioactive leaks.

• About two thirds (65%) of Americans now say they would oppose "the construction of a new nuclear reactor within 50 miles of [their] home." This figure was roughly the same as the 67 percent opposition level in the March 2011 survey.

The full poll is available at: http://www.civilsocietyinstitute.org/media/030712release.cfm