Greenhouse-gas emissions have produced the planet more than 1°C (1.8°F) warmer than it was in the pre-industrial days. Its atmosphere is producing heavy weather in ways both predicted and surprising. And, with emissions continuing, it will get worse.
Unfortunately, 2021 will probably be one of the 21st century’s coolest years. If temperatures rise by 3°C above pre-industrial levels in the coming decades — as they might even if everyone manages to honour today’s firm promises — large parts of the tropics risk becoming too hot for outdoor work. Coral reefs and the livelihood that depend on them will disappear and the Amazon rainforest will become a ghost of itself. Severe harvest failures will be commonplace. Ice sheets in Antarctica and Greenland will shrink (缩小) past the point of no return, promising sea rises measured not in millimetres, as today’s are, but in metres.
Six years ago, in Paris, the countries of the world committed themselves to avoiding the worst of that nightmare by removing greenhouse-gas emissions quickly enough to hold the temperature rise below 2°C. Their progress towards that end remains seriously inadequate. Yet even if their efforts increased dramatically enough to meet the 2°C goal, it would not stop forests from burning today; prairies (草原) would still dry out tomorrow, rivers break their banks and mountain glaciers disappear.
Cutting emissions is thus not enough. The world also urgently needs to invest in adapting to the changing climate. The good news is that adaptation makes political sense. People can clearly see the need for it. When a country invests in flood defenses, it benefits its own citizens above all others — there is no free-rider problem, as there could be for emissions reduction. So All the governments should make a broader move to increase investment in adaptation. More such efforts are vital.
1. What can we infer from Paragraph 1?| A．The weather will become better in the future. |
| B．The earth in the pre-industrial days was warmer. |
| C．Bad weather is often caused by greenhouse gases. |
| D．The appearance of bad weather is always expected. |
| A．Crops will fail a little now and a little then. |
| B．The melting ice will cause a sharp rise in sea level. |
| C．People can still make a living by relying on coral reefs. |
| D．It will be too hot for people to work outdoors all over the world. |
| A．None of the investment money comes from the nation. |
| B．The disasters would be avoided if the 2°C goal could be met. |
| C．When a country invests in flood defenses, its own citizens benefits most. |
| D．All the countries are trying to avoid the worst result by reducing the emission. |
| A．To analyse the possibility of meeting the 2°C goal. |
| B．To introduce a new method to study greenhouse-gas emissions. |
| C．To assess the consequences of cutting greenhouse-gas emissions. |
| D．To call each country government to raise investment in adaptation. |
相似题推荐
【推荐1】Generally speaking, convenience and safety affect how we choose to pay for things. Environmental concerns do, too.
Each time you pull out a credit, use a phone’s wallet app or hand over cash, you take part in a system. Some parts of that system make things, like coins, bills or cards. Other parts move money between buyers, sellers, banks and others. Used cash, cards and equipment will be eventually disposed of (处理), as well. Each part of this system uses materials and energy. And all parts produce waste.
Now researchers are looking more closely at how “green” these payment systems are. They’re finding buyers can help cut some of the environmental costs, no matter how they pay.
To understand the full “cost” to society of money or any other system, researchers can perform what’s called a life-cycle assessment. It looks at all the environmental impacts of a product or process. It starts with mining, growing or making the raw materials. It includes what happens while something is in use. And it considers the final disposal or reuse of things.
Even though raw materials are the first step, in fact there are raw materials added in at every single step along the journey. For money, raw materials go into each step of something that is “made”. Fuels are the raw materials for energy to make products and transport them. More energy goes into using products. Recycling or disposal also requires energy, plus water, soil or other materials.
People don’t realize most of those steps, so they can’t judge if one form of payment is dirtier or more costly. And that’s a problem, researchers say. It’s also what has got some of them to show more about the costs of how we pay for our lifestyles.
A life-cycle assessment doesn’t tell you what to do. However, it gives you an informed basis for making a decision.
1. What is Paragraph 2 mainly about?| A．The ways of paying. | B．The process of payment. |
| C．The waste produced by payment. | D．The introduction of payment systems. |
| A．The real value of money. | B．The history of the currency. |
| C．The effect on the environment. | D．The importance of raw material. |
| A．Steps. | B．Products. | C．Materials. | D．Fuels. |
| A．The Payment Patterns are Changing | B．How We Choose to Pay Affects the Environment |
| C．New Payment Patterns Have Come into Being | D．How We Make Payment Systems “Green” |
When you look at the map of the Tengger Desert (腾格尔沙漠), you will see a “green wall” in the southwest. It products Wuwei City of Gansu Province from sandstorms.
With an area of over 8,000 mu, the “green wall” was planted by Wang Tianchang and his family. They have done this great job for over 20 years.
In his seventies now, Wang Tianchang is an ordinary farmer from Gansu Province. He and his family live in a small village close to the Tengger Desert. People there once suffered a lot from sandstorms for a long time. They destroyed their farms and houses. To hold back sand, Wang Tianchang decided to do something. In 1999, Wang planted his first plant in the desert and started his life of sand control.
It is never easy to bring life on the desert. In the beginning, Wang had no experience with desert plants. The sand covered the holes he dug very soon. The wind rooted out the seedlings he planted even on the second day he had done. It was challenging, but he never gave up.
His family helped him a lot, especially his son Wang Yinji. To plant more trees, the two of them even lived in the desert for about six years. They found grass to sleep on as their beds.
Thanks to Wang’s “green wall”, Wuwei City sees much fewer sandstorms. Wang has brought back not only green to the desert but also hopes to the people there. He is our hero!
1. How long have Wang Tianchang and his family planted the “green wall” ?2. Why did Wang Tianchang want to control the sand?
3. Who helped Wang Tianchang a lot when planting the “green wall”?
4. 把短文划线句子翻译成汉语。
5. 给短文拟一个恰当的标题。
【推荐3】How to Be Eco-friendly
If you’d love to be more eco-friendly but don’t know where to begin, start with a few small changes.
Lowering Your Energy.
Turn off lights and unplug power strips (电源插板) that you’re not using.
Using public transportation.
Say no to unnecessary plastic straws, lids, and bags and stop using plastic wrap and plastic containers for food storage. Instead, you can use reusable water bottles made of sustainable material like glass, bamboo, and ceramic.
Considering growing a plant.
They add more oxygen to the air, which means a less polluted air. If you don’t have a green thumb, choose some plants that are rather easy to look after.
| A．Reduce your gas consumption and carbon emissions by walking, biking, or taking the bus. |
| B．Here are some suggestions for you to live an eco-friendly life. |
| C．Use less energy during the hot summer months and cold winter season. |
| D．This is an easy way to reduce energy use. |
| E．Using items more than once. |
| F．Cutting Back on Plastics and Waste. |
| G．“Lucky Bamboo” is especially good for that, since it demands nearly no attention. |
【推荐1】Tornadoes are nature’s most violent storms, which can cause deaths and destroy a neighborhood in seconds. A tornado appears as a rotating, funnel-shaped (漏斗形的) cloud that extends from a thunderstorm to the ground with whirling winds that can reach 300 miles per hour. Damage paths can be over one mile wide and 50 mileslong. Every state is at some risk from this disaster.
Some tornadoes can be seen clearly, while rain or nearby low-hanging clouds cover others. At many times, tornadoes develop so rapidly that little, if any, advance warning is possible.
Before a tornado hits, the air may become very still. A cloud of debris (散片) can mark the location of a tornado even if a funnel can not be seen. Tornadoes generally occur near the edge of a thunderstorm, when the strong wind may die down. It is not uncommon to see clear, sunlit skies behind a tornado.
The following are facts about tornadoes:
☆The average forward speed of a tornado is 30 MPH, but may vary from still to 70 MPH. Debris is picked up or a cloud forms in the funnel.
☆The average tornado moves southwest to northeast, but tornadoes have been known to move in any direction. Tornadoes are most often reported east of the Rocky Mountains during spring and summer months.
☆Tornadoes can happen together with tropical storms and hurricanes as they move onto land. Waterspouts are tornadoes that form over water.
☆Peak tornado season in the southern states of America is March through May; in the northern states, it is late spring through early summer. Tornadoes are most likely to occur between 3 p.m. and 9 p.m., but can occur at any time.
1. From the passage, we learn that tornadoes come from ______.| A．hurricanes | B．great heat |
| C．thunderstorms | D．sandstorms |
| A．The wind may die down. | B．A clear and sunlit sky may appear. |
| C．The air may become still. | D．Its position may be marked by clouds. |
| A．only happen in the late hours of the day | B．only move from southwest to northeast |
| C．may form over sea water | D．often move at a speed of 70 MPH |
| A．tornadoes warning systems are well-developed in many countries |
| B．of all the natural disasters, tornadoes cause the greatest damage |
| C．tornadoes are mostly seen in the southern states of America |
| D．tornadoes may strike so quickly that there is often little or no warning |
【推荐2】Chinese scientists say they have developed a robotic fish that can remove microplastic particles from water environments. Researchers working on the project say the robots could help to clean up plastic pollution in oceans around the world.
The robotic swimmers are about 1.3 centimeters long. They are made of a soft chemical Compound. The robots are designed to absorb microplastics while moving through the water. The project was launched by a team at Sichuan University in southwestern China. The researchers said the robots have already performed well in shallow water and they plan to carry out more tests in deeper waters. The scientists reported their findings in a new study in Nano Letters. The publication comes from the American Chemical Society, a nonprofit organization supported by the U.S. Congress. The robotic fish were built to target microplastic particles, which are smaller than five millimeters. Studies have confirmed that microplastic pollution has been discovered in many natural environments. The material comes from the breakdown of manufactured plastic products and industrial waste.
The team said the robots can be controlled by light. Turning “a near-infrared light laser” on and off causes the fish’s tail to move back and forth, the American Chemical Society said. The robotic fish can swim up to 2.76 body lengths per second. The researchers said this is faster than most similar soft robots. Wang Yuyan was a member of Sichuan University’s research team. She told Reuters news agency that the small, lightweight robot is currently being used to collect microplastics for research purposes. But Wang added that the team plans to expand that use so the robot fish can remove larger amounts of microplastic waste from deep ocean areas. The fish can take in different kinds of microplastics and even repair itself when damaged, the researchers said. And if a robot fish is accidentally eaten by a real fish, it can safely digest the material, the team added. Wang said similar robots could be developed to be placed inside the human body to remove unwanted materials or diseases.
1. Why has a robotic fish been created?| A．To remove disease in people. |
| B．To clean up pollution in oceans. |
| C．To remove unwanted materials in body. |
| D．To remove microplastic particles in water. |
| A．The purpose of the robotic fish. |
| B．The function of the robotic fish, |
| C．A further introduction of the robotic fish. |
| D．Potential application of the robotic fish. |
| A．It will be harmless. | B．It will repair itself. |
| C．It will take in microplastics. | D．It will collect microplastics. |
| A．Pessimistic. | B．Positive. | C．Unclear. | D．Suspicious. |
【推荐3】Thanks to the hybrid rice that was discovered by Yuan Longping,the hunger problem of thousands of Chinese people was mostly fixed in the 1980s.
On Sept 8th,Yuan, together with two other scientists, won China's 2018 Future Scientist Prize, for his continuous research on rice. Even on his 88th birthday on Sept 7th, he took part in the International Development Forum of Rice Production in Hunan province. Although he was recovering from an illness at the time, he was happy to talk to reporters about his latest work on seawater rice.
Yuan has been researching on rice since he was at college. In 1964. he discovered a natural hybrid nice plant in Hainan. Since then, he has focused on developing high yield, hybrid nice varieties (多样性). In1973,he became the first to successfully cultivate (培育) a type of hybrid rice species in the world. With the hard work of Yuan's group for about ten years, the production of the rice was increased (From 150kg per mu (亩) to 500kg per mu and more). These varieties now take up about two thirds of China's rice crop, according to China News. So, it's no wonder that he's known as the “Father of Hybrid Rice”。
And because of China's Belt and Road (一带一路) initiative,Yuan's hybrid rice is helping to solve food problems around the world.According to Xinhua News Agency,hybrid rice plants in Kenya produce fcur to five times more nice than the country's usual rice plants. With a rising fame all over the world. Yuan gave a speech in English at the 9th Shandong High-level Talents Forum in Qingdao last year.His speech made him an internet sensation. Beginning with “I speak broken English",his 20-minute speech turned out to be a huge success, with barely any pauses or mistakes.
The humble Yuan was simply being modest during his speech. According to au article in1999 by CNN,the scientist speaks both English and Russia fluently.“I never need an interpreter when I go overseas.”he hold the US news network. Butin spite of his great knowledge,Yuan inderstands that even the wisest people should stil he told Xinhua.“We should learn from them.”
1. Where was the International Development Forum of Rice Production held?| A．Hainan | B．Hunan | C．Shandong | D．Kenya |
| A．He has focused on developing high-yield.hybrid rice varieties. |
| B．He was the first to successfully cultivate a type of hybrid rice species in the world. |
| C．Because of Yuan's group, the production of the rice was increased. |
| D．Hybrid rice plants in Kenya produce four to five times more rice than the country's rice plants. |
| A．Chinese | B．English |
| C．Russian | D．French |
| A．Yuan Longping won China's 2018 Future Science Prize. |
| B．Yuan Longping's hybrid rice is helping to solve food problems around the world. |
| C．Yuan Longping got fame around the world. |
| D．The character and contribution(贡献）of Yuan Longping. |
