1 . In much of the western United States, drought and access to fresh water is a critical issue. However, recently California came up with a novel solution. The state approved regulations that allow agencies to purify wastewater for drinking. This recycled wastewater may be consumed in homes, schools, and businesses.
As the population in California has exploded in recent decades, the state has struggled to meet demands for fresh water. Recycled wastewater will allow the state to increase access to the precious resource.
Recycled wastewater is not new to the state. It has previously been used in ice hockey rinks (冰球场), for crops, and to generate artificial snow. But now, water agencies will have the option to put recycled wastewater back into pipes for drinking. California is only the second state to allow purified wastewater to be consumed. The first was Colorado in 2022.
While the idea of drinking recycled wastewater may be off-putting, regulators spent more than a decade developing rules and regulations to ensure safety. Independent panels of scientists also reviewed the state’s rules around recycled wastewater consumption. All water will be treated for pathogens (病原体) and viruses before being available for consumption.
So far, the state’s plan has been met with approval from large water agencies. Many of them have plans to construct wastewater recycling plans over the next few years. In Southern California, the Metropolitan Water District of Southern California has set a goal aiming to produce 150 million gallons of direct and indirect recycled water per day. This water will be in the pipes of the 19 million people throughout the six counties that the agency serves.
Officials are aware that a certain amount of public convincing may still be necessary. However, they remain optimistic about the future of the project, reminding consumers that the water is safe, and that recycled water is already in use in California.
1. Why does California pass new regulations about recycled wastewater?| A．To ease the pressure of drought. | B．To increase the supply of fresh water. |
| C．To recycle the wastewater for industry. | D．To reduce the pollution of the wastewater. |
| A．Surprising. | B．Necessary. | C．Funny. | D．Awful. |
| A．The goal of wastewater recycling is hard to achieve. |
| B．The state’s plan will be conducted by water agencies. |
| C．Southern California will reduce its water production. |
| D．People in California tend to prefer recycled water. |
| A．Many people still disapprove of the project. |
| B．The public are optimistic about the project. |
| C．It will never be suitable to use recycled water. |
| D．The project is the only solution to water shortage. |
1. What are the speakers talking about?
| A．The jewelry. | B．A robbery. | C．A fact. |
| A．The computer. | B．The jewelry. | C．The fridge. |
| A．He has found some traces. |
| B．He is on the way back from Canada. |
| C．He has no idea what has happened. |
3 . Few Americans remain in one position or one place for a lifetime. We move from town to city to suburb, from high school to college in a different state, from a job in one region to a better job elsewhere, from the home where we raise our children to the home where we plan to live in retirement. With each move we are forever making new friends, who become part of our new life at that time.
For many of us summer is a special time for forming new friendships. Today millions of Americans vacation abroad, and they go not only to see new sights but also with the hope of meeting new people. No one really expects a vacation trip to produce a close friend, but the beginning of a friendship is possible.
The word “friend” can be applied to a wide range of relationships — to someone one has known for a few weeks in a new place, to a fellow worker, to a childhood playmate, to a man or woman, to a trusted confidant.
1. Many Americans move from place to place for the following reasons except_______.| A．going to college | B．getting a better job |
| C．saving money | D．finding a place to live in retirement |
| A．enjoy the sunlight | B．feel strange | C．get a new job | D．travel to other countries |
| A．expect to find some close friends | B．hope to meet new people |
| C．want to begin lasting friendships with new people | D．Both A and B |
| A．Today millions of Americans vacation abroad. |
| B．For many of us summer is a special time for forming new friendships. |
| C．No one really expects a vacation trip to produce a close friendship. |
| D．But surely the beginning of friendship is possible. |
Chinese singer Liu Genghong posts fitness videos on Douyin,
Pu Zhengning, associate professor of Southeast University, says the epidemic (流行病) has limited access
As an alternative to people
“Cloud fitness” is no flash in the pan, offering a great alternative to expensive gym memberships. In the past, aerobics on TV proved
Swimmers enjoy cold swims
Many people enjoy swimming in icy cold water. An open-air swimming pool,
Until the lockdown for England was announced on 4 January, outdoor pools were allowed to remain open. “Demand has taken us by surprise,” said Murray Heining, a volunteer at the Woburn Lido. Over Christmas and New Year, the lido had to offer extra openings to keep up with the demand from
Cold-water swimming has grown in popularity in the UK over the past few years. A survey found that 7.5 million people in England had swum in outdoor pools, as well as lakes, rivers and the sea, in 2018. In some areas, such as the river Wharfe in Yorkshire, this new trend has made environmental groups think more about
Some people make it a regular practice;
The Outdoor Swimming Society classifies temperatures below 6℃ as “Baltic” and from 6-11℃ as “freezing”. They advise people
It wasn’t just the water that was cold—many people experienced a white Christmas; snow fell in several counties including Yorkshire and Suffolk. Paul Davies, the UK Met Office’s chief meteorologist (气象学家), a scientist
6 . Rising food prices have taken a big bite out of what Canadians are able to serve up for dinner but food economists say our ability to cope has been deteriorated by our common decline in cooking skills. “We are less able to cook than we were 30 or 40 years ago, and so it’s much more difficult for us to adapt our diet,” said Mike von Massow, an associate professor at the University of Guelph.
A 2010 federal government report called Improving Cooking and Food Preparation Skills, the most recent of its kind, said that all across the population, processed and pre-prepared foods have been permitted. “Related to this permission is the potential lack of transference of basic, traditional cooking and food preparation skills from parents to children and adolescents,” the report reads.
Moreover, the quality of pre-prepared foods in the market remains uneven, with problems related to the lack of detailed labelling on such products, as well as difficulties in logistics and distribution.
Annie Belov, a 21-year-old student, has taught herself a lot about cooking since food prices started shooting up. “When the inflation (通货膨胀) wasn’t as bad, I was constantly eating out,” said Belov. That might mean food on campus or picking up a prepared item at Safeway when the price was still around $5, she said.
Belov now often makes dishes such as Caesar salad, as well as hearty pasta salads that combine carbs with vegetables and a bit of chicken. Belov said she’s a lot more efficient in the kitchen thanks to building her skills through trial and error. “Now, definitely more than before, I can kind of look in the pantry or in the freezer and be like, ‘OK, yeah, I can make a meal quickly and easily.’”
It’s important to note, however, that cooking skills alone cannot solve the affordability problem, said Elaine Power. And in 2023, Food Banks Canada says food insecurity is rising with inflation and the high cost of living. So while cooking skills can better position people to feed themselves and their families as best they can in forced circumstances, “that doesn’t, and can’t, make up for income that is inadequate in the first place.”
1. Which is the closest in meaning to the underlined word in paragraph 1?| A．worsened. | B．interrupted. | C．puzzled. | D．upset. |
| A．Failing to attract diners. |
| B．The loss of cooking skills. |
| C．Difficulties in keeping its flavors. |
| D．Shortage of fresh ingredients. |
| A．She suffers a tough financial patch. |
| B．She ends up showing a love of cooking. |
| C．She used to dine out at a restaurant. |
| D．She receives cooking education in schools. |
| A．Lower cost of living. | B．More cooking at home. |
| C．Food security status. | D．Increased income. |
7 . Smart phones provide a palm (手掌)-size window to the world, enabling us to do almost anything at the touch of a button. Smart homes look after themselves, and virtual meeting s mean that for many, time spent commuting is a thing of the past.
So we should have more free time. Time which is now spent sleeping, relaxing or simply doing nothing-right? We recently interviewed 300 people across Europe to understand how they used digital devices in day-to-day life. This research showed that people want to avoid empty periods of time in their lives, so they fill those periods performing tasks, some of which wouldn’t be possible without technology.
Whether it was waiting for a bus, waking in the morning, or lying in bed at night, our research reported that time which would previously be “empty” was now filled with brain training apps, creating lists of things they should do or try based on their social media feed, and other life admin.
On the face of it some of these tasks may seem like examples of tech saving us time. In theory, online banking should mean I have more time because I no longer need to go to the bank in my lunch break. However, our research suggests that this is not the case.
If the idea that you have more time than ever before is making you choke on your coffee, you are not alone. There is growing evidence that while digital technology may help us to save some time, we end up using that time to do more and more things. For many people, it is no longer enough to simply eat dinner, watch TV or maybe do an exercise class. Instead, in an attempt to avoid wasting time, these activities are performed while also browsing the web in search of the ingredients for a more perfect life and trying to develop a sense of achievement.
It seems that people still see going for a walk or actually being with friends as more valuable than being online. Maybe if we put down the phone a little more, we would have the time to actually cook those recipes we watch online.
1. What conclusion can be drawn in the first paragraph?| A．Technology makes our lives easier. |
| B．We can’t live well without modern technology. |
| C．Virtual meeting is a thing of the past. |
| D．A smart home offers you luxury and convenience. |
| A．It is an essential means of relaxation. |
| B．It does good to perform daily tasks. |
| C．It is secretly stolen by technology. |
| D．It forces people to do more work. |
| A．It’s not too late to get free time back. |
| B．Lunch break can be saved by online banking. |
| C．Doing little or nothing is sometimes OK. |
| D．Technology leads to a denser form of life. |
| A．Students in on-line learning. |
| B．Employees working in the bank. |
| C．People relying on digital devices. |
| D．Researchers in the technological lab. |
1.描述该现象；
2.表达你的观点及理由。
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9 . A shocking 53.6 million metric tons of electronic waste was discarded last year, a new UN-backed report has revealed. The report shows that e-waste is up by 21% from five years ago. This isn’t surprising, considering how many more people are adopting new technology and updating devices regularly to have the latest versions, but the report also shows that national collection and recycling strategies are nowhere close to matching consumption rates.
E-waste contains materials including copper (铜), iron, gold and silver, which the report gives a conservative value of $ 57 billion. But most are thrown away or burned rather than being collected for recycling. Precious metals in waste are estimated to be worth $ 14 billion, but only $ 4 billion-worth is recovered at the moment.
While the number of countries with national e-waste policies has grown from 61 to 78 since 2014, there is little encouragement to obey and a mere 17% of collected items are recycled. If recycling does occur, it’s often under dangerous conditions, such as burning circuit boards to recover copper, which “releases highly poisonous metals” and harms the health of workers.
The report found that Asia has the highest amounts of waste overall, producing 24.9 million metric tons (MMT), followed by Europe at 12 MMT, Africa at 2.9 MMT, and Oceania at 0.7 MMT.
But whose responsibility is it? Are governments in charge of setting up collection and recycling points, or should companies be responsible for recycling the goods they produce? It goes both ways. Companies do need to be held accountable by government regulations and have incentives to design products that are easily repaired. At the same time, governments need to make it easy for citizens to access collection points and deal with their broken electronics in a convenient way. Otherwise, they may turn to the easiest option — the landfill.
1. What does the underlined word “discarded” most probably mean?| A．increased | B．distributed | C．thrown away | D．consumed |
| A．The functions of policies. | B．The great damage to environment. |
| C．The change of consumption rates. | D．The urgency of recovering e-waste. |
| A．It does harm to the workers’ health. | B．It lacks national policy support. |
| C．It hardly makes profits. | D．It takes too much time. |
| A．New technology should be used to update old devices. |
| B．Governments and companies should take responsibilities. |
| C．Non-poisonous metals had better be used in e-device. |
| D．Citizens must play a key role in recycling e-waste. |
10 . We are all aware of the damaging pollution that’s created by driving petrol and diesel (柴油) vehicles. Many of the world’s cities are blocked with traffic, creating fumes containing gases such as nitrogen oxides. The solution for a cleaner, greener future could be electric vehicles. But how optimistic should we be? There was much excitement last year when the UK government announced it will ban the sale of new petrol and diesel cars from 2030. But is that easier said than done?
The road to global traffic being totally electric is still a long way off. Currently, battery life is an issue — a fully charged battery won’t take you as far as a full tank of petrol. There are also limited numbers of charging points to plug an EV into. Of course, technology is always improving. Some of the biggest tech companies, like Google and Tesla, are spending huge amounts of money developing electric cars. And most of the big car manufacturers are now making them too.
Colin Herron, a consultant on low-carbon vehicle technology, told the BBC: “The big leap forward will come with solid state batteries, which will appear first in mobile phones and laptops before they progress to cars.” These will charge more quickly and give cars a bigger range. Cost is another issue that may discourage people from switching to electric power. But some countries offer incentive, such as cutting prices by reducing import taxes, and not charging for road tax and parking. Some also provide exclusive lanes for electric cars to be driven on, overtaking traditional cars which might be stuck in jams.
These kinds of measures have made Norway the country with the most electric cars per capita (人均) at more than thirty electric cars per 1000 inhabitants. But Colin Herron warns that “electric motoring” doesn’t mean a zero-carbon future. “It’s emission-free motoring, but the car has to be built, the battery has to be built, and the electricity does come from somewhere.” Maybe it’s time to think about making fewer journeys or using public transport.
1. Which statement can we infer from the question at the end of Paragraph 1?| A．Electric vehicles may not solve the traffic problems. |
| B．Probably it is hard to procure a greener future by means of electric vehicles. |
| C．We should not be too optimistic about the future. |
| D．It’s not a good idea to replace petrol vehicles with electric ones. |
| A．Improvements. | B．Drawbacks. | C．Communications. | D．Bonuses. |
| A．Putting solid-state batteries in electric cars first will be a “great leap forward”. |
| B．There are four obstacles on the road to global traffic being totally electric. |
| C．Electric cars might not get stuck in traffic jams in the future. |
| D．Electric motoring will create a zero-carbon future. |
| A．Total Electric Traffic: a Long Way to Go. |
| B．Electric Power or Petrol: a Tough Decision to Make. |
| C．Petrol and Diesel Vehicles: a Main Source of Gases. |
| D．Electric Vehicles: a Road to a Modern Society. |
