2 . Since the 1950s, some 9.2 billion tonnes of plastic have been produced globally, of which only about 10% has ever been recycled. Yet environmentally conscious companies and consumers continue to look to recycling as a way to ease the plastic problem. Manufacturing giants claim to be committed to making more of their products and packaging from recycled materials. However, this confidence masks (掩饰) a complex web of issues around plastic recycling. Recycling rates remain extremely low and critics argue that we should look at alternative ways to tackle plastic pollution.

While many plastics have the potential to be recycled, most are not because the process is costly, complicated and the resulting product of a lower quality than the original. Despite rising demand for recycled plastic, few waste companies turn a profit. Part of this is because virgin plastic-linked to oil prices - is often cheaper than recycled plastic, meaning there is little economic incentive to use it. Worse yet, much of our plastic waste is difficult to recycle. Lightweight food packaging, like a mozzarella packet, contains different plastics, dyes and toxic additives (添加剂). This dirty mix means plastic recycled through mechanical methods- the most common form- can only be melted down and moulded (浇铸,塑造) again a couple of times before it becomes too fragile to be reused. And the nature of the process means plastic recycling has a carbon footprint of its own.

Given all of these difficulties, environmental critics say recycling is not the solution-and argue that creating more products from recycled material to attract environmental consciousness merely worsens the problem. “The solution is to use less plastic and to stop misleading the public about the recyclability,” says Enck, president of Beyond Plastics, a US campaign group with a mission to end single-use plastic. “They should stop making false claims about the recyclability of plastics since they know most will either be littered (乱扔) or burned or landfilled (填埋). Using less plastics means shifting to reusable products and relying more on paper, cardboard, glass and metal- -all of which should be made from recycled content.”

1. What is an environmentally conscious customer’s attitude towards recycling plastics?

A．Suspicious.

B．Favorable.

C．Indifferent.

D．Disapproving.

2. What does the underlined word “incentive” in Paragraph 2 probably mean?

A．motive.

B．issue.

C．crisis.

D．policy.

3. What is Paragraph 2 mainly about?

A．The recycling process of plastics.	B．Pollutants contained in recycled plastics.
C．Reasons why users dislike recycled plastics.	D．Contributing factors to low plastic recycling rates.

4. What will the environmental critics be happy to see according to the text?

A．Using metal or glass food containers.	B．Littering recycled plastics in a landfill.
C．Processing plastics in a mechanical way.	D．Launching campaigns to promote recyclability.

3 . Imagine being able to pop to your local park and pick some tomatoes, potatoes or even bananas to take home for dinner. Sounds too good to be true, right? For residents of Andernach, German, it’s not just a dream—it’s their reality.

In 2010, Andernach began its edible(可食用的)city project, planting 101 varieties of tomatoes in public green spaces around the city centre. Its 30,000 residents are free to help themselves to whatever grows, as are any other visitors.   The town’s motto of sorts is “Picking is encouraged—help yourself!” Every year a new type of plant is highlighted. In 2011, 100 types of beans were planted, while 2012saw the introduction of 20 onion varieties.

It’s a community effort, as local citizens are encouraged to help plant and maintain the gardens. This offers an opportunity to socialise as well as to learn about planting, cultivating and harvesting food.

An Andernach resident spoke to DW,“I often drop by to pick some herbs that I’m missing at home. Everything is easily accessible. There aren’t any fences. You just take what you need. The only thing is that you have to be quick once the fruits are ripe or they’ll all be gone!”

Andernach may have been the first in German, but it isn’t the only edible city. It’s part of the Edible Cities Network, a project funded by European Union to connect green urban foot initiatives around the world. Other cities include Carthage in Tunisia, Havana in Cuba and Sempeter-Vrtojba in Slovenia. In February 2022, the first Edible Cities Network Conference took place. Dr Ina Saumel, principal investigator of the Edible Cities Network, called it “a unique opportunity to invite researchers of edible city solutions and practitioners to the same table.”

Ultimately, the Edible Cities Network aims to give people “greener, more edible and, above all, more livable cities.” It is a response to the pressures of global climate change, and a significant cause full of hope.

1. What can residents do in public green spaces according to the edible city project?

A．Sell the produce they grow there.

B．Learn knowledge about planting.

C．Grow whatever plant as they like.

D．Pay to pick some vegetables there.

2. Which words can best describe the edible city project in Andernach?

A．Novel and popular.	B．Creative and costly.
C．Common and fundamental.	D．Rare and unacceptable.

3. What can we know about the Edible Cities Network from Dr Ina Saumel’s words?

A．Andernach is the only city to carry it out.

B．European Union originally established it.

C．It helps combine theories with practices.

D．It invites people to share meals together.

4. What is the purpose of the Edible Cities Network?

A．To help residents relieve their pressure.

B．To involve residents in urban planting.

C．To increase the produce supply in cities.

D．To create environmentally friendly cities.

4 . Several days of unusual warm weather in northern Greenland have caused rapid melting(融化). “Temperatures have been running around -12.2 ℃-15.5 ℃. It is warmer than normal for this time of year,” scientists said. The amount of ice that melted in Greenland between July 15 and July 17 alone—6 billion tons of water per day—would be enough to fill 7.2 million Olympic-sized swimming pools, according to the report from the National Snow and Ice Data Center. Put another way, it was enough to cover the whole state of West Virginia with a foot of water.

For the scientists out on the ice sheet(冰盖), the warmth has been alarming. “It really makes me anxious,” said Kutalmis Saylam, a scientist who is now working in Greenland. “Yesterday, we could hang about in our T-shirts, which was not really expected. Since Greenland holds enough ice, sea level would rise by 7.5 meters around the world if ice all melted.”

In 2020, scientists found that Greenland’s ice sheet had melted beyond the point of no return. “No efforts to prevent global warming can stop it from finally breaking into small parts,” said researchers.

Aslak Grinsted, a climate scientist, said that they were trying to get flights into the camp so they can ship out the ice cores(冰芯) they had recently collected. But the warmth is destabilizing the landing site. “The weather we are seeing right now is too hot for the ski-equipped planes to land,” Grinsted said. “So we store the ice cores in large caves we have made into the snow to protect it from the heat of the summer.” Scientists made use of the abnormal warmth while they were waiting, playing volleyball in their shorts on an ice sheet at the top of the world.

Grinsted referred to the temperatures as a heat wave, and noted that the possibility of temperatures getting this hot was clearly connected to global warming.

1. How does the author support the topic of paragraph 1?

A．By exploring reasons.	B．By making comparisons.
C．By designing the numbers.	D．By doing some experiments.

2. What did Kutalmis mean in paragraph 2?

A．He disliked wearing a T-shirt.

B．He worried about the warmth.

C．He was deeply impressed by the ice.

D．He was thirsty for enjoying the sea view.

3. What does the underlined word “destabilizing“ mean in paragraph 4?

A．Quitting.

B．Improving.

C．Sheltering.

D．Destroying.

4. What will the author probably do in the following paragraph?

A．Recommend visiting Greenland.

B．Describe how to ship out the ice core.

C．Call on people to protect the environment.

D．Plan to organize a sports meeting on ice.

5 . When the monthly electricity bill came home, parents always couldn’t believe their eyes, as the amount was much more than needed.     1     Here are some tips for parents to educate their children on how to save energy.

Switch off the lights. Assign one day in a week for a “turn off” practice, for a few hours. Tell the kids the significance of using less electricity and how it impacts the environment.     2    

Use energy-efficient transportation. When parents and their children are out on vacation, have a cycling outing. When the whole family rides bicycles together, it not only serves as a great bonding exercise, but it also teaches the children about eco-friendly transportation options.     3    

Play a game.     4     Engage them in a game instead. Ask the little ones to walk around the house with pen and paper, and make a note of all the equipment that consumes energy. Let them suggest what measures can be taken within the home to reduce consumption of electricity and go green. Parents can stick small notes near these appliances to give them interesting information on conservation.

    5     Create a theatre-like experience at home on a Sunday and gather everyone in the family, especially the kids, to watch an informative film about environmental issues or climate change. If parents have slightly older children, they can discuss the film and ask them what they think.

A．Watch an environmental film.

B．Talk with children about their opinions.

C．Play some games related to environmental protection.

D．Lecturing kids about environmental issues won’t help.

E．It makes them aware of the environmental effect of cars.

F．Light up some candles and play a board game to keep the children occupied.

G．So parents should urge their children to take up environment -friendly projects.

6 . In an area that’s surrounded by Scotland’s coal mining past and its industrial present, there’s a transformation happening beneath our feet. Just three years ago this area was re-engineered to bring the coastal wetland back to its natural state.

Allison Leonard, Royal Society for the Protection of Birds, “We tear down the coastal defenses and let the water back in. But within a year or two we were seeing saltmarsh plants reappear. And we’re now three years down the line and you know, it’s all saltmarsh. And at that point we kind of just stepped back and let nature do its thing, and we’re really seeing the wildlife respond. So birds are using it at high tide and we see lots of deer, hares in the spring.”

As well as a diverse wetland habitat, this marsh has become a natural tool in our fight to reduce emissions of greenhouse gas into the atmosphere. Marshland plants absorb one of those key planet-warming gases, carbon dioxide, which then becomes buried in the mud. Lucy Miller, Research technician, University of St Andrews, said “This is some of the most organic-rich soils we find in the UK, compared to agricultural land, forest, forestry land. So we’ll wrap this up in cling film and then just to keep it, hold its shape and then we take it back to the University of St Andrews. We have a laboratory there. We will just perform a couple of experiments using a couple of different machines to measure the different layers, different levels of carbon within the layers of the core here.”

Allowing the sea to reclaim this stretch of land has provided a glimpse of how we can help nature to help us deal with the climate crisis.

1. What do the underlined words “a transformation” refer to?

A．The reappearance of saltmarsh.	B．The recovery of the coastal wetland.
C．The bigger emissions of greenhouse gas.	D．The fiercer climate crisis.

2. What can we infer from Paragraph 3?

A．Marshland plants take in harmful gases.	B．Researchers have handled water pollution.
C．The air quality will be improved.	D．The marsh makes a pollution-free environment.

3. Why will Lucy Miller take away some of the soils?

A．To measure levels of carbon in each layer.	B．To get the data of different levels of soils.
C．To check the quality of different soils.	D．To compare different soils.

4. What does the text mainly talk about?

A．The industrial transformation.	B．The solution to the climate crisis.
C．The coastal wetland back to its natural state.	D．The fight to reduce emissions of greenhouse gas.

8 . It is reported that half the world’s forests have already been destroyed. This widespread destruction is due to deforestation (采伐森林). Deforestation is the removal of a forest or group of trees where the land is later transformed to a non-forest use. Cutting down trees is necessary for man’s survival. However, deforestation has a number of negative effects on the environment and needs to be controlled.

There are two main purposes for cutting down trees and one of them is to use the trees as resources. Essential items like paper, furniture and charcoal are all made from trees. Deforestation is also carried out to clear land for farming and to make room for roads and houses. As the population grows, more of the forest has to be cleared.

Although deforestation is necessary up to a point, it has some negative effects on the environment. Firstly, cutting down forests destroys animal habitats, leaving them with no place to live in. Deforestation also allows erosion to occur, which leaves the land easy to landslides and makes it difficult for plants to grow there. Finally, the removal of trees also worsens air pollution. Trees act as natural air filters that change carbon dioxide into oxygen. When they are removed, carbon dioxide can build up and pollute the atmosphere. Hence, it is obvious that deforestation harms the environment.

Due to the harm deforestation causes, it is necessary to control it. There are a number of ways to do this. One of them is to make better use of farming land. That means we do not need as much land for farming, and hence do not need to cut down so many trees. There must also be laws to limit deforestation and these laws must be enforced strictly. On top of that, reforestation must be carried out systematically. This method involves planting new trees and plants in areas where deforestation has occurred to replace what was destroyed.

To sum up, although deforestation must be carried out, it can harm the environment and must be controlled. Beyond a certain point, this damage to the environment cannot be fixed. Hence, we should do our best to make sure that the damage is never too great to fix.

1. What is the second paragraph mainly about?

A．How people get farmland.

B．What trees mean to human beings.

C．Why people carry out deforestation.

D．What effect deforestation has on environment.

2. What consequence may deforestation bring to animals according to the text?

A．Homelessness.

B．Extinction.

C．Disease.

D．Wars.

3. According to the text, how can we control the harm of deforestation?

A．By replacing new trees.	B．By banning deforestation.
C．By passing laws to limit farmland.	D．By making the best of farmland.

4. What may be the worst result if deforestation is beyond control?

A．Carbon dioxide will pollute the atmosphere.

B．There will not be any forest left in the world.

C．The damage to the environment will be beyond repair.

D．People will have no trees as resources for essential items.

9 . Catch your reusable bag and kiss your plastic bags goodbye. Plastic waste is on its way out, thanks to these governmental bans from around the world.

From Indiana to Maine, governments at all levels in the US are forcing bans and improving recycling. People are shopping smarter and companies are doing better to ensure the protection of our environment. Slowly but surely, the world is entering a brighter future as more and more countries follow. But there’s still a lot of work to be done—or undone.

Since the 1950s, researchers say that about more than 8.3 billion tons of plastic has been produced. And 60% of that waste has ended up in the environment. That number has increased quickly over the years. For example, it was recorded that the world’s plastic production doubled from 1976 (50 million tons) to 1989 (100 million tons). It was highest at 368 million in 2019 before decreasing to 367 million in 2020.

A million tons decrease of plastic production is not enough to deal with the rising pressures plastic puts into the environment. We still do not know how long it takes for plastic to breakdown. It means that about 12 million tons of plastic waste that entered the ocean in 2010 is still breaking into micro plastics and filling up the stomachs of birds and sea animals. The plastic going into our environment is not going away. While recent studies of plastic-eating enzymes and bacteria offer some hope for the future of plastic waste management, the best way to deal with our environmental stress is through decrease.

In 2020, New York City began to ban plastic bags. But this wasn’t the first plastic bag ban in a US state. In fact, the US wasn’t even the first country to introduce this idea. Back in 2002, Bangladesh became the first country to implement a plastic bag ban. Since then, other countries have followed, introducing their own ways to fight with the continuing plastic bags.

1. What do we know about plastic waste?

A．We have completely cleaned it up	B．It is hardly increasing all over the world.
C．We have done nothing to deal with it.	D．There is a long way to solve the problem of it.

2. How much plastic waste has been put into the environment since the 1950s?

A．More than 8.3 billion tons.	B．About 5 billion tons.
C．About 100 million tons.	D．Less than 368 million tons.

3. What can be inferred about dealing with plastic?

A．It doesn’t take long to breakdown it	B．Sea animals can be eating most of it.
C．Some enzymes and bacteria help a lot.	D．Cutting plastic waste down is still the best way.

4. What does the underlined word “implement” in the last paragraph mean?

A．Carry out.

B．Keep up.

C．Look at.

D．Take away.

10 . Earthquakes are a natural disaster—except when they're man-made. The oil and gas industry has forcefully used the technique known as hydraulic fracturing (水力压裂法) to destroy sub-surface rock and liberate the oil and gas hiding there. But the process results in large amounts of chemical-filled waste water. Horizontal drilling (水平钻孔) for oil can also produce large amount of natural, unwanted salt water. The industry deals with this waste water by pumping it into deep wells.

On Monday, the US Geological Survey published for the first time an earthquake disaster map covering both natural and “induced” quakes. The map and a report show that parts of the central United States now face a ground-shaking disaster equal to the famously unstable terrain (不稳定地形) of California.

Some 7 million people live in places easily attacked by these man-made quakes, the USGS said The list of places at highest risk of man-made earthquakes includes Oklahoma, Kansas, Texas, Arkansas, Colorado, New Mexico, Ohio and Alabama. Most of these earthquakes are relatively small, in the range of magnitude (震级) 3, but some have been more powerful, including a magnitude 5.6 earthquake in 2011 in Oklahoma that was connected to waste water filling.

Scientists said they do not know if there is an upper limit on the magnitude of man-made earthquakes; this is an area of active research. Oklahoma has had prehistoric earthquakes as powerful as magnitude 7.

It's not immediately clear whether this new research will change industry practices, or even whether it will surprise anyone in the areas of newly supposed danger. In Oklahoma, for example, the natural rate of earthquakes is only one or two a year, but there have been hundreds since hydraulic fracturing and horizontal drilling, with the waste water filling, became common in the last ten years.

1. What kind of human activities can cause earthquakes?

A．The man-made produced waste water in the factories.

B．The process of digging deep wells in those poor areas.

C．The advanced techniques used to deal with waste water.

D．The oil or gas industry's work connected with the earth.

2. What does the underlined word “induced” in paragraph 2 mean?

A．Man-made.	B．Reduced.
C．Newly-built.	D．Controlled.

3. How much magnitude can man-made earthquakes reach?

A．It's been said as small as magnitude 3.

B．It has been said as high as magnitude 7.

C．It's being studied without a final conclusion.

D．It has risen by an average of magnitude 5. 6.

4. What is the best title for the text?

A．Natural Earthquakes in America Are Disappearing Now

B．7 Million Americans at Risk of Man-Made Earthquakes

C．Time for Oil and Gas Industry Change Their Working Practice

D．More Often Earthquakes as Powerful as Magnitude 7 in America