1. 图片简介;
2. 个人感想。
Earth Day
注意:1. 写作词数应为80个左右;
2. 请在答题卡的相应位置作答。
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2 . James Rainey reads trees like most people read signposts. The senior ecologist is using a small hand camera to identify a lichen (地衣) that is surrounding the base of wild pines (松树) in a deep narrow valley on the west coast of Scotland. He is looking for ecological clues of species associated with the ancient Caledonian Forest, which once covered most of the Highlands.
Wild pines have been growing in Scotland continuously since the ice age, offering a globally unique ecosystem supporting rare wildlife. But now less than 2% of the original growth survives, with just 14 individual Caledonian pinewood sites now officially recognized. “To meet the demand for more wood, many wild pines in Highlands have been removed to make room for commercial forestry,” says Rainey. “This was often done in ancient woodlands and was really damaging to the remaining trees.”
But restoration is still possible, especially since some old trees still survive along with the ancient woodland soil and seedbank—seeds stored in the soil, which can grow once the heavy shade of commercial conifers (针叶树) is removed.
The ecological investigator uses three clues of evidence to discover where these pinewoods first stood. “First there’s the historical evidence, like old maps and texts. Then comes the landscape context: is the pine associated with planting around a big house, or is the setting more natural? And finally I use the ecological evidence: wild pine usually grow alongside old birch trees, which indicates ecological continuity,” explains Rainey.
Rainey has identified 23 pines in this area, all rooted in places least accessible. Their needles have been taken for genetic testing to confirm their family trees. “This would have been filled with trees but is now empty — these are the most critical areas in need of regeneration and we want the whole of the ancient woodlands to recover, not just the pines,” he said.
1. Why are the wild pines considered to be so significant?A.They act as a signpost for the highland. | B.They are an indicator of an ancient forest. |
C.They are an alternative to commercial forestry. | D.They provide a shelter for certain species of lichen. |
A.The existence of ancient seeds. | B.The presence of commercial conifers. |
C.The awareness of the forest protection. | D.The application of the advanced technology. |
A.By locating big houses. | B.By consulting historians. |
C.By referring to digital maps. | D.By making the most of surroundings. |
A.To confirm the genes of the pine. | B.To restore the old-growth woodlands. |
C.To explore the unfrequented places. | D.To enrich the diversity of the wild pines. |
3 . Chaudhary weaves (编织) together lengths of rope and grass collected from the nearby riverbank in her village, skillfully shaping the materials into a gift box while instructing a group of women to follow suit.
The ropes being used were once the lifeline for mountain climbers tackling Nepal’s mountains and were then cast away. Diverse measures to remove such discarded materials have rocketed since 2019, when the government launched Clean Mountain Campaign.Around 140,000 tons of waste were collected on Mt. Everest alone, which were handled accordingly, either securely buried or recycled.
Some waste is now finding fresh life, transformed by skilled hands like Chaudhary’s into items to sell, thanks to an initiative led by Acharya, an owner of a waste processing business and an advocate for sustainable waste management. She has been working with the cleaning campaign, aiming at mountains like Mt. Everest.
“Metal waste goes through the recycling process, but we weren’t capable of recycling these ropes and cooking gas cans,” Acharya says. It didn’t occur to her that the waste which couldn’t be recycled could be reused until she met Rai at an art exhibition and a solution emerged.
Rai, a businessman dealing in craftworks, helped connect Acharya with Chaudhary and her team of craftswomen in hopes of unlocking the economic value of the mountain waste. With flexible hours, the project gives the craftswomen an opportunity to earn money even as they maintain their household responsibilities.
“While this seems insignificant compared to waste in the mountains, it’s a start. We can’t supply sufficient raw material with waste sorting and cleaning processes taking plenty of time and money,” Acharya says, desperate to expand the program to involve more women and treat more waste. But progress has been slow. “We need investment to mechanize the cleaning and processing of waste in the initial phase to provide the crafting team with enough materials to meet their demand,” she adds.
1. What were the ropes mentioned in paragraph 2 initially intended as?A.Tools for tying up weeds. | B.Villagers’ basic necessities of life. |
C.Raw materials tor unique artworks. | D.Life-saving devices for mountaineers. |
A.A journey to the rural area. | B.An encounter with a trader. |
C.Information from a product launch. | D.Attendance at an academic conference. |
A.Train more senior technicians. | B.Obtain a better reputation. |
C.Drop waste washing procedures. | D.Bring in advanced equipment. |
A.Chaudhary: An Eco-Minded Folk Artist |
B.Nepali Women Are Turning Garbage into Crafts |
C.Clean Mountain Campaign Has Already Taken Effect |
D.A Headache: Mt. Everest Is Heavily Littered with Waste |
4 . We breathe, eat and drink tiny particles of plastic. But are these in the body harmless. dangerous or somewhere in between? A small study published on Wednesday in the New England Journal of Medicine raises more questions than it answers about how these hits might affect the heart.
The study involved 257 people who had surgery to clear blocked blood vessels in their necks. Using two methods, researchers found evidence of plastics-mostly invisible nanoplastics — in 150 patients and no evidence of plastics in 107 patients. They followed these people for three years. During that time, 30 or 20% of those with plastics had a heart attack, stroke or died from any cause, compared to 8 or about 8% of those with no evidence of plastics.
The researchers also found more evidence of inflammation (炎症) in the people with the plastic bits in their blood vessels. Inflammation is the body’s response to injury and is thought to raise the risk of heart attacks and stroke.
“I hope that the alarming message will raise the consciousness of citizens, especially governments, to finally become aware of the importance of the health of our planet.” said Dr. Raffaele Marfella of the University of Campania in Italy.
Nevertheless, the study was very small and looked only at people with narrowed arteries (动脉), who were already at risk for heart attack and stroke. The patients with the plastics had more heart disease, diabetes and high cholesterol (胆固醇) than the patients without plastics. They were more likely to be men and more likely to be smokers. The researchers tried to adjust for these risk factors during their statistical analysis, but they may have missed important differences between the groups that could account for the results. This kind of study cannot prove that the plastics caused their problems.
“More research is needed and it is the first report suggesting a connection between microplastics and nanoplastics with disease in humans,” said Dr. Philip Landrigan of Boston College. Other scientists have found plastic bits in the lungs, liver, blood, and breast milk, “It does not prove cause and effect, but it suggests cause and effect,” he said, “And it needs urgently to be either confirmed or disproven (反驳) by other studies done by other investigators in other populations.”
1. What did the study find about the plastics in blood?A.They are visible and detectable. | B.They may raise the risk of serious injuries. |
C.They need to be removed by surgery. | D.They may account for a higher rate of heart attacks. |
A.Immediate action should be taken by government. |
B.Alarming message should be spread widely and quickly. |
C.The awareness of the harm of plastic bits should be enhanced. |
D.Joint efforts must be made to keep healthy physically and mentally. |
A.Limitations. | B.Advantages. | C.Causes. | D.Effects. |
A.Helpful but unrealistic. | B.Pioneering but impractical. |
C.Distinctive but unnecessary. | D.Suggestive but inconclusive. |
5 . Do you know cultivated meat? Typically, making this sort of meat starts with cells from domestic animals. The cells are grown in bioreactors full of nutrient-rich liquid, and then harvested, and eventually become products such as steak or chicken. In a homely kitchen of Eat Just, a startup, a slice of such meat was fried and then served with peppers. The first mouthful of it was extraordinary because the meat was grown in a lab, rather than on an animal. Meanwhile, it was also dull, because the texture, taste, look and smell of the meat was almost identical to that of chicken.
In June, Eat Just and Upside Foods became the first two companies to win regulatory approval to sell cultivated meat in America. A handful of other firms are trying to bring cultivated meat to market. But the hope is fading owing to continued high costs and troubles with mass production.
The UN reports meat and dairy production already accounts for 12% of humanity’s greenhouse-gas emissions, Demand for meat is skyrocketing among the growing middle classes of Africa and Asia. Lab-grown meat could help meet that demand without the world breaking its carbon budget. By contrast, two-fifths of Americans claim to restrict their meat consumption either for ethical(伦理的) reasons or environmental ones. Lab-grown meat may seem less ethically worrisome than eating animals. And the early success of plant-based meat alternatives gave investors hope. Beyond Meat, one such firm, went public in 2019, and saw its value shoot to $14 billion.
Though lab-grown meat offers an alternative to farm-grown meat, questions have been raised about how climate-friendly it can be. A study published earlier this year found that in some circumstances cultivated meat could be more polluting than the conventional stuff because the bioreactor is in great need of power to control its temperature. Consequently, only if renewable energy is used in the production process will cultivated meat cut the carbon footprint of the meat industry.
Whether this effort can make lab-grown meat attractive and cheap enough to attract consumers remains to be seen.
1. What does the author focus on concerning cultivated meat in paragraph 1?A.Its characteristics. | B.Its health benefits. |
C.Its cooking methods. | D.Its similarities to artificial meat. |
A.Most Americans skip meat. |
B.Asians prefer lab-grown meat. |
C.Beyond Meat is facing financial collapse. |
D.Lab-grown meat may have a vast consumer market. |
A.Poisonous chemical leaks. | B.Land occupation. |
C.Grecnhouse-gas emissions. | D.Water consumption. |
A.Opposed. | B.Favorable. | C.Uncaring. | D.Reserved. |
6 . The ocean is home to more than 200,000 known species and as many as 2 million that we have yet to discover. And, it is also home to 24.4 trillion pieces of microplastics. In 2022, researchers spotlighted how bad marine microplastic pollution, is getting: The total amount of microplastics on the bottom of oceans has greatly increased. in the past two decades.
Microplastic particles don’t just end up at the bottom of the ocean. Animals are eating them — at least 1,500 species have been reported to ingest plastic. And a lot of it. For example, whales in New Zealand’s Hauraki Gulf consume roughly three million microplastics daily, according to research published in Science of the Total Environment, which analyzed whale waste to see how much microplastics were present.
“Other research has shown that if plastics are small enough, they can cross the gut(肠道) wall and get into internal organs though the long-term effects are still unclear. Plastics can also release chemicals that are harmful to digestive system,” says Kahane-Rapport. “This is concerning, and while we do not yet understand the long-term health-effects, it is likely not a good sign for whales and their prey(猎物) to eat a man-made material like plastic.”
This is obviously bad for whales, but it also has effects on humans and the ocean at large. We are also part of these food chains and are consuming microplastics regularly. They are in our bottled water, in our table salt — they are even in our house dust and in the air we breathe. And we still don’t know what the health effects are. Meanwhile, the impact on whales — and what it indicates — is troubling on many fronts. “Whales are ecosystem engineers,” says Kahane-Rapport. “They can spread the nutrients that they consumed and serve as ecosystem guards — when whales are not healthy, other parts of the system will suffer.”
Kahane-Rapport says more research is needed. “The next research step will be to determine how much plastic the whales excrete(排出) and how much is left in their bodies. Following that, we would be able to determine the direct health effects on their tissues.”
1. What does the underlined word “ingest” in paragraph 2 probably mean?A.Deal with. | B.Bring up. | C.Take in. | D.Spread out. |
A.Researches show contradictory results. |
B.Digestive system is the most affected part. |
C.Small plastics are more harmful than big ones. |
D.Much about microplastics’ harm remains unclear. |
A.The various sources of pollution. |
B.Tab chain reaction of microplastics. |
C.Possible solutions to plastic pollution. |
D.Growing awareness of ocean protection |
A.Microplastic pollution to the ocean bottom |
B.The sufferings of other ocean creatures. |
C.Whales’ contributions to the ecosystem. |
D.The amount of plastic in whales bodies. |
7 . Plastic, once seen as a revolutionary material for its wide application and convenience, has become a global environmental crisis because it is non-biodegradable. The ubiquity (无处不在) of plastic in our daily lives has led to an increasing amount of plastic waste, causing great harm.
One of the most alarming examples of this crisis is the Great Pacific Garbage Patch, a floating mass of plastic waste in the North Pacific Ocean. It is estimated to be twice the size of Texas and consists of everything from microplastics to abandoned fishing nets. Marine life often mistakes plastic particles for food, leading to ingestion and death. Additionally, the chemicals used in plastic production can pollute water and soil, and finally threaten marine ecosystems.
Plastic waste is not limited to the oceans; it also impacts the land. Landfills overflow with plastic waste, emitting (排放) harmful greenhouse gases as plastics break down slowly over time. The production of plastics is highly energy-intensive and contributes to greenhouse gas emissions, exacerbating climate change. Furthermore, plastic litter is evident in urban and rural landscapes, destroying the natural beauty of our planet.
Beyond its environmental impact, plastic poses serious health risks to humans. Many plastics contain harmful chemicals, which can be found in food and drinks when plastic containers are used for storage and heating. These chemicals have been linked to a range of health problems, including developmental issues and cancer.
In conclusion, the problem of plastic pollution demands urgent action. A comprehensive strategy for cutting down on plastic is essential to tackle these challenges and safeguard the well-being of our planet and its inhabitants.
While reducing the consumption of plastic may seem challenging, it is achievable through a combination of policy measures, technological innovations and changes in consumer behavior. Governments must issue laws to ban or heavily regulate single-use plastics and promote alternatives. Businesses should adopt sustainable packaging practices, and individuals can reduce plastic consumption by making conscious choices.
1. What does the example of the Great Pacific Garbage Patch show?A.Animals rely on plastic waste to survive. |
B.Plastic is too widespread to remove. |
C.Plastic waste is harming the oceans. |
D.Plastic poses health risks to humans. |
A.Worsening. | B.Controlling. | C.Recording. | D.Evaluating. |
A.Ways to cut plastic consumption. |
B.Problems of handling plastic. |
C.Alternatives for plastic products. |
D.Some benefits of banning plastic. |
A.Plastic Packaging Is Everywhere |
B.Plastic Consumption Should Be Reduced |
C.How Should Plastic Be Used |
D.How Plastic Products Affect People |
8 . Shop Sustainably
If you have to name one thing that contributes most to your ecological footprints, you may say the energy you use at home, or your car’s emissions.
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●Avoid unnecessary packing. Buy loose fruit and vegetables instead of pre-packaged produce, and avoid products that contain multiple single packages or double packaging, like grain in a box and a bag. Consider switching from tea bags and coffee pods to tea leaves and ground coffee.
●Go organic when you can. In addition to the benefit organic farming has to insect biodiversity, it’s also considered more sustainable and better for the environment.
●Buy seasonal and native products.
A.Take reusable grocery bags. |
B.Select single-use plastic bags. |
C.It supports local farmers and food producers. |
D.You can also refill your own containers with loose-packed food. |
E.When buying organic products, look for those officially certified. |
F.But it’s what we eat that accounts for up to 60% of our personal demand. |
G.You’ll find it convenient whenever you buy tea or coffee in the supermarket. |
In downtown Xiamen, Fujian Province, a 6-meter-high mound(土堆) that stretches for 60 to 70 meters stands in contrast to the high-rise
The blue-tailed bee-eater, or Merops philippinus, is known for its colorful plumage and on the Chinese mainland it
In recent years, with improved environmental conditions in Xiamen and the city government’s commitment
In 2015, the center
The birds,
The 13-year experience of preserving blue-tailed bee-eaters has given the center a grasp of their habits and made the Wuyuanwan Nature Reserve a stable home for them.
10 . Watford and her family have lived in Curtis Bay, Baltimore for generations. Her community has faced environmental injustice. Heavy industries continued to move in her community. As a result, her neighbors have had to live with serious respiratory (呼吸的) problems.
When she knew a plan to build the nation’s largest trash-burning incinerator (焚化炉) less than a mile away from her high school, she realized she had to take action. The incinerator was being sold wrongly as clean, renewable energy equipment but actually it would be a source of brain-damaging chemicals and would release 200 million tons of greenhouse gases per year, both worse than coal burning. Watford felt she had a responsibility to warn her community to work together to shut this plant down.
She co-founded Free Your Voice (FYV), a 10-person student organization devoted to community rights and social justice. Together, they decided to start a campaign to take down Energy Answers, the incinerator’s developer. They went door-to-door talking to neighbors and organizing protests.
When it was discovered that Baltimore City Public Schools (BCPS) was going to be a customer of Energy Answers, the organization fought with the board and presented their case, urging BCPS to withdraw from the project. BCPS was convinced to cancel their contract, which in turn inspired 22 other customers to do the same. Without any financial gain, Energy Answers had no market to move forward with its plan.
Watford continues to work with Curtis Bay residents toward fair development. They have a vision for the future which includes building a zero-waste movement, a solar farm, and green jobs. She wants the entire human family to join the fight for environmental justice because survival as a species depends on our ability to take action.
1. What caused respiratory problems in Watford’s community?A.Poor medical care. | B.Terrible environmental conditions. |
C.Constant bacterial infection. | D.Unbalanced distribution of resources. |
A.Unfavourable. | B.Doubtful. | C.Unclear. | D.Indifferent. |
A.BCPS lost financial support. | B.Energy Answers stopped its plan. |
C.The investors found new market. | D.Many customers revised their contracts. |
A.A teenage hero against urban pollution |
B.A teenage hero fighting for an advanced city |
C.A battle for Baltimore’s sky by a teenage hero |
D.The social justice challenge for a teenage hero |