Sustainability Film Festival: Terra Blight

• Event Date: Wednesday, April 23, 2014
• Time: 6:00 pm–7:30 pm (CDT)
• Location: Knight Auditorium, Spurlock Museum, 600 S. Gregory St., Urbana, IL
• Cost: Free Admission

• Film

Terra Blight (2012) Unrated, 55 minutes.

Terra Blight is a 55-minute documentary exploring America’s consumption of computers and the hazardous waste we create in pursuit of the latest technology. Terra Blight traces the life cycle of computers from creation to disposal and juxtaposes the disparate worlds that have computers as their center. From a 13-year-old Ghanaian who smashes obsolete monitors to salvage copper to a 3,000-person video game party in Texas, Terra Blight examines the unseen realities of one of the most ubiquitous toxic wastes on our planet. By the film’s end, the audience will never look at their computer the same way again.

This series of sustainability-related documentaries is presented by the Illinois Sustainable Technology Center (ISTC) as a part of the University of Illinois Earth Week festivities. Each screening is followed by audience discussion with ISTC staff members and other campus or local experts as available or appropriate. The films, Living Downstream, Terra Blight, and Waste=Food, explore the environmental consequences of human production and management strategies, and will allow university students, staff, and the general public to learn more about ISTC, important sustainability issues, relevant campus projects and local resources, and actions they can take to “green” their own lives. DVDs of the documentaries, along with downloadable resource lists and activities, will be made available after the film series at the Prairie Research Institute (of which ISTC is a division) Library for professors, students, and members of the general public to check out for use in classes, meetings, and for personal enrichment.