Extinc­tion Rebel­lion, World Wildlife Fund presents “Our Plan­et” and Liz Bon­nin. All on the Blue­dot sus­tain­abil­i­ty programme 

Women’s rights activist and writer Helen Pankhurst will fea­ture along­side Tom Shake­speare and a rep­re­sen­ta­tive from Extinc­tion Rebel­lion on the pan­el talk ‘Protest for Change: Direct Action and Soci­ety’. A con­tro­ver­sial form of polit­i­cal cam­paign­ing, direct action seeks to con­front soci­ety, trig­ger debate and incite change. While some defend its valid­i­ty as a peace­ful and vital part of a tru­ly lib­er­al democ­ra­cy, oth­ers decry the impact of the dis­rup­tion cause, and the cost to pub­lic ser­vices. This high-pro­file pan­el of speak­ers will explore the effec­tive­ness of direct action, from the suf­fragettes through to the con­tem­po­rary envi­ron­men­tal­ist move­ment, Extinc­tion Rebellion.

Fol­low­ing their col­lab­o­ra­tion on David Atten­bor­ough’s ground­break­ing Our Plan­et, WWF will be onsite pre­sent­ing screen­ings and In Con­ver­sa­tion talks with the cre­ators of the series. There will also be talks through­out the week­end with WWF’s envi­ron­men­tal experts. The fes­ti­val will also host a series of DotTalks which will explore var­i­ous issues sur­round­ing the plan­et. TV Pre­sen­ter Liz Bon­nin will host ‘ The Prob­lem with Plas­tics’ which will explore the prob­lem of marine plas­tic pol­lu­tion and reveal the full scale of the prob­lem across our oceans whilst lec­tur­er Tam­sin Edwards will cov­er the sto­ry of cli­mate sci­ence. Astro­physi­cist Eamonn Kerins will host PLEXIT – a look into the pos­si­bil­i­ty of life on oth­er planets.

The fes­ti­val has also announced the con­cept Space­ship Earth – the future of our blue­dot – a world view that humans should work togeth­er har­mo­nious­ly to look after the plan­et. Work­ing in uni­son with Jodrell Bank, blue­dot will imple­ment a num­ber of sus­tain­abil­i­ty ini­tia­tives that will con­tin­ue to sup­port the con­cept. Ini­tia­tives include no sin­gle use plas­tic across the food traders on site, reusable bot­tles for all staff and wrist­bands made from bam­boo and recy­cled plas­tic. Green Events, the cater­ing com­pa­ny for the fes­ti­val, will work with food sal­vage scheme 8^th Plate again this year to sal­vage any food waste at the fes­ti­val and donate to the local com­mu­ni­ty to help those liv­ing in food poverty.

Col­lab­o­rat­ing with Red Fox Cycling, fes­ti­val goers can now trav­el sus­tain­ably in a one-day canal-side cycle ride from Man­ches­ter to Jodrell Bank. Designed to encour­age atten­dees to reduce their car­bon emis­sions. Perks of tak­ing part include VIP tick­et upgrades and a free mete­or show­er pass for lux­u­ri­ous hot show­ers across the weekend.

Cus­tomers will also have the options to make a ‘Car­bon Off­set’ dona­tion when they pur­chase their tick­ets to the fes­ti­val with blue­dot invest­ing 100% of this in renew­able ener­gy with Ener­gy Rev­o­lu­tion, a fes­ti­val indus­try col­lab­o­ra­tive charity.

Squid Soup the UK-based inter­na­tion­al group of artists, researchers, tech­nol­o­gists and design­ers will be on site with their project Sub­mer­gence – an immer­sive walk­through expe­ri­ence. The instal­la­tion uses many thou­sands of indi­vid­ual points of sus­pend­ed light to cre­ate feel­ings of pres­ence and move­ment with­in phys­i­cal space.

 

Glob­al inno­va­tor Prac­ti­cal Action will be on site to dis­cuss the inge­nious, prac­ti­cal ways in which peo­ple can free them­selves from pover­ty and dis­ad­van­tage whilst experts from

Take a Bite out of Cli­mate Change will dis­cuss how tech­nol­o­gy is help­ing to low­er emis­sions from food.

Day tick­ets priced £59.75 per per­son. Full week­end camp­ing tick­ets start from £169.  discoverthebluedot.com