1 . A research project called Mineral has created robots that move around in farm fields, collecting information about how plants are growing. The project aims to use computers to help farmers grow more food in ways that are healthy for the environment.
The Mineral project is run by a company called X, which is created by Alphabet — the same company that owns Google. X often focuses on projects with big goals that seem almost impossible at first.
With the number of people on earth getting bigger each year, more food needs to be grown in order to feed everyone. As weather patterns continue to change because of the climate crisis, this task is becoming even more difficult. Some experts say that to feed everyone, more food will need to be grown over the next 50 years than in the last 10,000 years. In the past, farmers tried to quickly increase the amount they produce, using methods that were not always healthy for the environment — more fields, fertilizers, and pesticides.
Instead, the focus of the Mineral project is on getting farms to produce more by improving conditions for each plant. Elliot Grant, who leads the project, says the goal is to “manage the plant instead of the plot.” Mineral’s team spent several years talking to farmers to see what problems they were having and how these problems might be fixed. That led to the creation of special robots, called “plant buggies”.
At first, the buggies were very simple. They were built on bicycles and took pictures with cell phones. Over time, they’ve been improved repeatedly. The plant buggies roll on four wheels and are high enough to glide (滑行) over rows of plants without hurting them. They’re covered in solar panels and have strong wheels, allowing them to roll through muddy fields. The robots can take detailed pictures of plants, track each plant’s location, and measure the plant’s size.
Before, farmers had information about the soil and the weather, but they couldn’t track every plant. Now, with Mineral’s robots, they can. By collecting lots of information like this, Mineral believes computers can help farmers make predictions about how their plants will grow. Studying each individual plant could end up saving time and money. For example, if robots can spot which plants have diseases, farmers can quickly get rid of these plants before they ruin the entire crop, allowing farmers to only fertilize and water the plants that truly need it.
1. What’s the Mineral project’s goal?| A．To replace farmers with robots. |
| B．To design and sell farming robots. |
| C．To better handle environmental pollution. |
| D．To improve food production in a green way. |
| A．Ambitious | B．Productive | C．Potential | D．Profitable |
| A．The increasing population. | B．The constant disasters. |
| C．People’s bigger appetite. | D．The development of industry. |
| A．The series of events. | B．A secret plan. |
| C．The mark on a map. | D．A piece of farmland. |
| A．They can collect soil information. |
| B．They can make weather predictions. |
| C．They can monitor each plant’s condition. |
| D．They can help fertilize and water the crops. |
The environmental group Heal the Bay organized a beach clean-up. And I was one of the volunteers. We went to Venice Beach to clean up the trash.
At first glance, the beach didn’t look dirty at all. But then I saw a Styrofoam (泡沫) cup half buried in the sand on the beach. I pulled hard and finally got it out. As we moved farther, we found pieces of Styrofoam spread all over the sand. Sea animals eat the plastic. After eating it, they think they are full. As a result, they can die of starvation as they are cheated by their feeling and don’t think they need to eat any food.
We kept on picking up the trash. Then I saw someone with a full Heal the Bay trash bag and I went to see what was inside. When I opened the trash bag, I found everything from a pair of old jeans and a brown belt to headphones and some plastic bags. It made me very angry with the people who left their things behind without thinking what effects they might have on the ocean.
By noon, the sun was shining and the temperature was rising. The volunteers that had spread out across Venice Beach were coming back to throw the trash they had collected into the truck. I could not believe how much trash there was. All together we collected more than 135 bags of trash. I do hope that next time people go to the beach, they will stop littering.
1. Why did the environmental group go to Venice Beach?2. What does the underlined word “starvation” in Paragraph 2 mean in English?
3. How did the author feel seeing the trash in that volunteer’s trash bag according to Paragraph 3?
4. How much trash did the they collect all together that day?
5. What do you think of throwing plastic trash on the beach? And why?
3 . Many animals and plants are endangered in the world today. These endangered species are threatened with becoming extinct, meaning they will no longer exist on Earth. Examples include the Cuban Macaw and the Sri Lankan Legume Tree. Hunting, and collecting of the Macaw bird for pets, led to its extinction. Whilst the main reason the native Sri Lankan Legume Tree went extinct was due to habitat loss from development in the 20h century. The main cause for animals and plants disappearing is often a disruption (扰乱) to the food chain due to hunting, habitat loss or even the introduction of invasive (入侵的) species.
Every living thing from one-celled animals to a blue whale needs to eat. Nature is connected and controlled by many fragile (脆弱的) food chains. A food chain describes who eats whom in a habitat. When one of the links in a food chain is no longer present — for example, a species goes extinct — the food chain breaks and sometimes this can cause other animals to disappear and the whole system can become imbalanced or even collapsed.
Humans can have disastrous effects on food chains. When people first explored the world, they took animal and plant species from their home countries to the places they explored and settled in. They did not realise the consequences of introducing invasive species. By doing so, they were disrupting the natural food chains of the areas they explored.
Nowadays there are strict rules controlling the movement of animals and plants between countries. But some parts of the world are still experiencing problems with invasive species introduced hundreds of years ago.
With rising awareness of how we affect the natural environment, hopefully we can learn to protect these food chains and help them to thrive. Otherwise the continued loss of species will eventually mean our own extinction.
1. What could be inferred from Paragraph 1?| A．Macaws are extinct because of habitat loss |
| B．Sri Lankan Legume Tree became extinct because of seed collecting. |
| C．The invasive species may lead to the extinction of the native species. |
| D．The main cause of plants extinction is hunting. |
| A．It only affects one-celled animals. | B．It decides the balance of the whole system. |
| C．It is always broken by invasive species. | D．It is controlled by fragile nature. |
| A．By settling in. | B．By taking away native species. |
| C．By hunting local animals. | D．By introducing foreign species. |
| A．to continue to live or exist |
| B．to grow toward full stature or physical or mental maturity |
| C．to become, and continue to be, successful, strong, healthy, etc. |
| D．to get away from an unpleasant or dangerous situation |
| A．The food chain will always find a way to be balanced. |
| B．The natural world experiences times of damage but it always can recover. |
| C．Human activity, in all forms, tends to cause great destruction to the natural world. |
| D．Despite the climate change caused by humans, plants and animals will go extinct naturally. |
Milan-based company Krill Design is changing the way we think about waste by creating furniture products from a plastic-like biomaterial named Rekrill. The special material is biodegradable, and can be used repeatedly.
Founded in 2018, Krill uses fruit skin, orange seeds and coffee grounds collected from businesses in Italy to create their unique designs, including bookends, clocks, bowls, and lamps. Each product is made through a four-step process. “There are a lot of companies that create designs, and we want to be different,” says MarcoDi Maio, director of operations at Krill.
Krill has worked together with some well-known brands and has also joined in a Co. ffee Era project with the government of Milan to reduce coffee waste produced in three of the city's neighborhoods. Krill has made products that match the color of food waste. For example, bright orange products are from orange skin and rich dark brown products are from coffee grounds.
Rekrill is as strong as wood and breaks down safely unless it's touched by water or acidity. It is also safe for fish to eat. But despite its eco-friendly benefits, Rekrill is more expensive than common plastic due to its complex production process. However, Krill hopes that as awareness of the environmental impact of plastics grows, Rekrill will be more widely used. Krill is exploring the use of other food waste, such as eggshells and leftover tomatoes and grapes, aiming to make its production process more efficient and cost-effective.
The company believes Rekrill is the material of the future. Every small step they take toward a sustainable world contributes to a more recyclable economy and inspires others to follow suit.
1. How does the company Krill Design change the way people think about waste? (no more than 10 words)2. How many steps does each product need before it is made? (no more than 2 words)
3. What is the disadvantage of Rekrill compared with common plastic? (no more than 5 words)
4. What does the underlined word in paragraph 1 mean? (no more than 1 word)
5. What do you think of Rekrill and explain? (no more than 20 words)
A small town in southwest Britain is banning plastic bags in an attempt to help the environment and cut waste — a step that environmentalists believe is a first for Europe.
Shopkeepers in Modbury, population 1,500, agreed to stop handing out disposable plastic bags to customers on Saturday. They said paper sacks and cloth carrier bags would be offered instead.
Last month, San Francisco became the first U. S. city to ban plastic grocery bags. Internationally, laws to discourage the use of plastic bags have been passed in parts of South Africa and Ireland, where governments either tax shoppers who use them or fine companies that hand them out. Bangladesh already prohibits them, and so do at least 30 remote Alaskan villages.
Modbury, about 225 miles southwest of London, has also declared a bag amnesty (宽限期), allowing local people to hand in plastic bags that have piled up at home. They will be sent for recycling.
The Modbury ban was the idea of Rebecca Hosking, who saw the effect of bags on marine life while working in the Pacific as a wildlife camerawoman. She said response in the town so far had been “really positive”.
“Modbury is quite an old-fashioned town and a lot of people have wicker baskets to go out shopping anyway,” Hosking told Sky News Television.
The Worldwatch Institute, an environmental research agency, states that 100 billion plastic bags are thrown away each year in the United States alone. More than 500 billion are used yearly around the world.
1. Why doesn’t Modbury allow the use of plastic bags?（no more than 10 words）2. What would be provided instead of plastic bags by shopkeepers in Modbury?（no more than 10 words）
3. What does the underlined word in paragraph 3 most probably mean?（1 word）
4. How will the plastic bags handed in by people of Modbury be dealt with? （no more than 6 words）
5. What is your opinion of disposable plastic bags? And why? （no more than 25words）
1.发出倡议的目的；
2.低碳生活的建议；
3.呼吁大家采取行动。
注意：1.不少于100词；2.可以适当增加细节，以使行文连贯。
提示：全球变暖global warming；低碳生活low-carbon life；循环可循环的东西recycle something recycable；节能项目energy-saving program；环保environmental protection；保护环境protect the environment
Dear students,
____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
Li Hua,
The Student’s Union
7 . We talk a lot about air pollution. Here in Hong Kong we always complain about light pollution as well. Then, there is noise pollution. It’s the same in many cities around the world. In Kathmandu, the capital city of Nepal, people have been complaining about/the noise made by drivers who continually sound their car horns (喇). That is until recently, when something was finally done about it.
‘The Chief District Officer of Kathmandu had received many. complaints about horn pollution. He said that everyone felt the use of the car horn in recent years had become excessive. Researchers in Kathmandu found that for about 80 percent of the time, it really was not necessary for drivers to use their car horns. Sounding the horn to make a noise had become more of a habit. It was no longer being used as it was supposed to be used: to warn people of danger.
At the beginning of the Nepali New Year in 2017, the local government passed a law to ban the use of car horns unless used correctly.
Within six months, 11,000 fines (罚款) had been collected by the local traffic police. The fine was about HK S360. A taxi driver in Kathmandu can make about HK S1,000 per day, so he could lose about one-third of his money it he broke the law.
As usual, there were many complaints from drivers. They said that cows and dogs were free to walk on the roads. They always caused danger. Sounding a car horn was the only way to get them to move out of the way. And although there were quite a few traffic lights in the streets of Kathmandu, very few of them worked. This meant there was often a traffic mess.
The ban on using a car horn went ahead, and within a few weeks the streets of Nepal’s capital were quieter-even though they were still just as busy. Because of the ban, drivers are a little more careful when they drive. Fewer accidents have been reported. The local government says the horn ban will now be copied in other areas of Nepal.
1. What do Hong Kong and Kathmandu have in common?| A．Both have been troubled by factory pollution. |
| B．Both have succeeded in fighting air pollution. |
| C．Both have been faced with the problem of noise pollution. |
| D．Both have received many complaints about horn pollution. |
| A．Car drivers usually use car horns unnecessarily. | B．The cars are becoming more and more. |
| C．Care drivers use car horns as a warning. | D．Everyone complain about the horn pollution. |
| A．In 2016. | B．In 2017. | C．In 2018. | D．In 2019. |
| A．No traffic lights in the streets can work. | B．The traffic on the roads is not very smooth. |
| C．Animals are not allowed to walk on the streets. | D．Drivers are required to drive on one-way streets. |
| A．It is useful. | B．It is worrying. | C．It is interesting. | D．It is embarrassing. |
8 . Most people suffer from what is known as “Just-me-ism”. What is that? Well, say you leave the tap running while you brush your teeth, leave a light on when you go out or you drop a piece of litter (垃圾) and can’t be bothered to pick it up. You know that all those things are wrong. But so what? “What difference can it possibly make?” you say to yourself. There are millions of people in the world and I’m just me. How can it matter if I leave one little tap running, one little light on or leave a little piece of litter on the road? “And anyway, no one will know,” Of course, it wouldn’t matter if there were just a few people in the world. But just think of all the millions of people saying to themselves: “It doesn’t matter. It’s just me. And, anyway, no one knows.” Millions of gallons of water would be wasted; millions of lights would be left on; millions of pieces of litter would be dropped. And all of this would be very harmful.
To inspire young people to take action for the environment, animals and their community, Roots & Shoots was established. This institute was set up in the early 1990s by Dr. Jane Goodall, a scientist who’s the world’s best-known expert on wild chimpanzees (黑猩猩). In addition to her research, she has been whole-heartedly committed to environmental protection, the whole purpose of Roots & Shoots is to educate young people, from preschoolers to university students, so they can help to build a future that is secure and live together in peace with nature. The organization is called Roots & Shoots because roots (根) move slowly under the ground to make a firm (坚实的) foundation, and shoots seem small and weak, but they can break open brick walls to reach the light. The roots and shoots are you, your friends and young people all around the world. Hundreds and thousands of roots and shoots can solve the problems, change the world and make it a better place to live in.
Do you think you help to make the world a better place when you make a sad person smile, when you make a dog wag (摇摆) its tail, and when you water a thirsty plant? One cheered-up person, one happy dog, one flowering plant, and you. That’s what Roots & Shoots is all about: the value and importance of each individual — human, animal or plant. Dr. Jane Goodall believes that the most important thing is that: “Every individual matters. Every individual has a role to play. Every individual makes a difference. You get to choose: Do you want to use your life to make the world a better place for people, animals and the environment? Do you want to make Roots & Shoots rooted in everyone’s heart? Do you want to be a part of a community for a shared future? You cannot be absent.”
1. What does the underlined part in Paragraph 1 probably mean?| A．I can do whatever I like and nobody knows. |
| B．I’m unique and no one realizes it. |
| C．I’m lonely. And, no one in the world knows me. |
| D．This is who I am. And, I don’t want people to know me. |
| A．establish Roots & Shoots |
| B．educate people to build a safer future |
| C．commit to environmental protection |
| D．guide young people to create a future in harmony with nature |
| A．All the people. | B．The youth. | C．Adults. | D．Our friends. |
| A．Wait-and-see. | B．Skeptical. | C．Admiring. | D．Encouraging. |
| A．To introduce Roots & Shoots. |
| B．To point out the disadvantages of “Just-me-ism”. |
| C．To call on young people to join Roots & Shoots. |
| D．To call people to pay more attention to animals and plants. |
9 . To save the environment, we must all join in — and nobody knows this better than 70-year-old grandmother Pat Smith who spent 2018 cleaning up litter from 52 beaches in Cornwall on the United Kingdom’s south coast.
Smith set out in January, 2018 to carry out her New Year’s resolution of making her community a better and cleaner place. The ambitious goal came to her after she watched a documentary on plastic pollution the previous year, and she knew she couldn’t just sit by.
Often, volunteers would join her in her efforts, including her grandchildren, or she would join hands with other campaigners such as Wayne Dixon, who is walking around the UK coast as an ambassador for Keep Britain Tidy.
During her beach cleans, Smith was sometimes mistaken for doing community service! She said, “People don’t understand I’ve been doing this voluntarily. We should all take responsibility for picking up the litter as well as ensuring we don’t drop litter in the first place.
Even before her beach cleanups, Smith had begun her first environmental campaign to eliminate plastic straws (吸管) in her city of Cornwall . To date, she has encouraged 600 local companies to stop using unnecessary plastic. In an effort to make her hometown an example for the plastic-free movement in the United Kingdom, she founded The Final Straw Cornwall in the summer of 2017. “I founded the Final Straw to try and raise awareness of the disastrous damage we are doing to our oceans from our casual consumption of single-use plastics. I feel I have a responsibility to my children and grandchildren to do something about it.” She said.
Her resolution year may be over but this environmentally conscious grandma continues her quest (追求). “A lot of the rubbish I’ve picked up consists of everyday items,” said Smith. “These things are used by all of us and it is shocking to find them polluting our beautiful beaches. Please let’s try to be more thoughtful in this coming year. I’m driven to try and protect our living planet for my children and grandchildren and I will continue to do everything in my power to achieve that.”
1. What led to Smith’s New Year’s resolution of cleaning her community?| A．Community service. |
| B．A film or television program. |
| C．Various ocean protection campaigns. |
| D．Serious pollution in her community. |
| A．She was forced to do that. |
| B．She just pretended to be caring. |
| C．She actually did only a little work. |
| D．She wouldn’t stick to the work for long. |
| A．set an example to other aged people |
| B．stop her local companies from producing plastic straws |
| C．keep her promise to her children and grandchildren |
| D．make people conscious of the plastic-related environmental problem |
| A．It’s everyone’s duty. |
| B．It’s as hard as people think. |
| C．Prevention is more important than protection. |
| D．The younger generation don’t care about it enough. |
| A．Proud. | B．Happy. | C．Stressed. | D．Determined. |
10 . William Lindesay, a famous Great Wall expert and conservationist, and his wife Wu Qi have traveled the globe, providing their sons with a unique growing environment. Sun hats, backpacks and sneakers (运动鞋) — these are the day-to-day must-haves for the family.
Most of their trips seem far from relaxing—cultural study in the hot and dry desert, a 53-kilometer hiking tour of New Zealand, a one-day climb to three English mountaintops and a six-day train ride from Beijing to Moscow.
Many assume the family must be wealthy and can afford their global travel, but they are not. Lindesay says they just choose to spend money on travel and eschew pricey hotels and restaurants when possible. Lindesay mentions the trip to Moscow as an example. Instead of taking a taxi from the railway station to the hotel, they took the subway. “We crossed the city for saving money, communicated with local people, and saw they were people just like us. We arrived at our destination feeling comfortable.”
However, their journeys, which can last weeks or months, have sometimes been inconsistent with their children's schooling. Wu remembers once Lindesay let their elder son ask for leave so that they could go to New York for a 45-day lecture tour. Therefore the son missed his final exam. Things like that bother the family all the time.
Lindesay attaches great importance to learning out of the classroom, saying that children might score well on school tests, but traveling outside, in distant lands with different languages, cultures and political structures, is the real test. “You can only get streetwise on the street. You can only get worldly-wise when seeing the world,” he says.
1. How can we describe the Lindesays'trips?| A．Pleasant. | B．Challenging. | C．Conventional. | D．Dangerous. |
| A．Avoid. | B．Visit. | C．Compare. | D．Evaluate. |
| A．They suffer from a tight budget. | B．They have scheduling conflicts. |
| C．They are faced with language barriers. | D．They hold different educational ideas. |
| A．Toughness is the best assistant of will. | B．There is no royal road to learning. |
| C．Actions speak louder than words. | D．Man who travels far knows more. |
