1 . According to the Solar Energy Industry Association, the number of solar panels installed(安装)has grown rapidly in the past decade, and it has to grow even faster to meet climate goals. But all of that growth will take up a lot of space, and though more and more people accept the concept of solar energy, few like large solar panels to be installed near them.
Solar developers want to put up panels as quickly and cheaply as possible, so they haven’t given much thought to what they put under them. Often, they’ll end up filling the area with small stones and using chemicals to control weeds. The result is that many communities, especially in farming regions, see solar farms as destroyers of the soil.
“Solar projects need to be good neighbors,” says Jordan Macknick, the head of the Innovative Site Preparation and Impact Reductions on the Environment(InSPIRE)project. “They need to be protectors of the land and contribute to the agricultural economy.” InSPIRE is investigating practical approaches to “low-impact” solar development, which focuses on establishing and operating solar farms in a way that is kinder to the land. One of the easiest low-impact solar strategies is providing habitat for pollinators(传粉昆虫).
Habitat loss, pesticide use, and climate change have caused dramatic declines in pollinator populations over the past couple of decades, which has damaged the U.S. agricultural economy. Over 28 states have passed laws related to pollinator habitat protection and pesticide use. Conservation organizations put out pollinator-friendliness guidelines for home gardens, businesses, schools, cities—and now there are guidelines for solar farms.
Over the past few years, many solar farm developers have transformed the space under their solar panels into a shelter for various kinds of pollinators, resulting in soil improvement and carbon reduction. “These pollinator-friendly solar farms can have a valuable impact on everything that’s going on in the landscape,” says Macknick.
1. What do solar developers often ignore?A.The decline in the demand for solar energy. |
B.The negative impact of installing solar panels. |
C.The rising labor cost of building solar farms. |
D.The most recent advances in solar technology. |
A.Improve the productivity of local farms. |
B.Invent new methods for controlling weeds. |
C.Make solar projects environmentally friendly. |
D.Promote the use of solar energy in rural areas. |
A.To conserve pollinators. | B.To restrict solar development. |
C.To diversify the economy. | D.To ensure the supply of energy. |
A.Pollinators: To Leave or to Stay | B.Solar Energy: Hope for the Future |
C.InSPIRE: A Leader in Agriculture | D.Solar Farms: A New Development |
Ecotourism is commonly regarded as low impact (影响) travel to undisturbed places. It is different from traditional tourism because it allows the traveler to become
Ecotourism has
Due to
·Minimize the impact of
·Build respect for and awareness of the environment and cultural practices.
·Provide
·Make sure that the tourism provides experiences for both the visitors and the hosts.
Komodo National Park, officially recognized in 1980, is popular for ecotourism because of its unique biodiversity.
内容包括:
1. 海洋的重要性;
2. 保护海洋的倡议。
注意:1. 词数100左右;
2. 短文的题目和首句已为你写好。
Our oceans, our responsibility
June 8th was named by the UN in 2009 as World Oceans Day...____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
Kim Cobb, a professor at the Georgia Institute of Technology in Atlanta, is one of a small but growing minority of academics
Cobb, for her part, started to ask conference organizers who invited her to speak
I've always loved the ocean. In the
I decided to do something
One day, I saw a commercial for a health-care company. People in the ad were using plastic straws (吸管). I found the contact information of the company
I kept going. Whenever I heard of businesses using plastic, I'd send an email. One of the biggest companies I wrote to
Diets have changed in China — and so too has its top crop. Since 2011, the country
A taste for meat is
According to the World Bank, China accounts for about 30 percent of total
7 . We may think we're a culture that gets rid of our worn technology at the first sight of something shiny and new, but a new study shows that we keep using our old devices(装置) well after they go out of style. That’s bad news for the environment — and our wallets — as these outdated devices consume much more energy than the newer ones that do the same things.
To figure out how much power these devices are using, Callie Babbitt and her colleagues at the Rochester Institute of Technology in New York tracked the environmental costs for each product throughout its life — from when its minerals are mined to when we stop using the device. This method provided a readout for how home energy use has evolved since the early 1990s. Devices were grouped by generation — Desktop computers, basic mobile phones, and box-set TVs defined 1992. Digital cameras arrived on the scene in 1997. And MP3 players, smart phones, and LCD TVs entered homes in 2002, before tablets and e-readers showed up in 2007.
As we accumulated more devices, however, we didn't throw out our old ones. "The living-room television is replaced and gets planted in the kids' room, and suddenly one day, you have a TV in every room of the house," said one researcher. The average number of electronic devices rose from four per household in 1992 to 13 in 2007. We're not just keeping these old devices — we continue to use them. According to the analysis of Babbitt's team, old desktop monitors and box TVs with cathode ray tubes are the worst devices with their energy consumption and contribution to greenhouse gas emissions(排放)more than doubling during the 1992 to 2007 window.
So what's the solution(解决方案)? The team's data only went up to 2007, but the researchers also explored what would happen if consumers replaced old products with new electronics that serve more than one function, such as a tablet for word processing and TV viewing. They found that more on-demand entertainment viewing on tablets instead of TVs and desktop computers could cut energy consumption by 44%.
1. What does the author think of new devices?A.They are environment-friendly. | B.They are no better than the old. |
C.They cost more to use at home. | D.They go out of style quickly. |
A.To reduce the cost of minerals. |
B.To test the life cycle of a product. |
C.To update consumers on new technology. |
D.To find out electricity consumption of the devices. |
A.The box-set TV. | B.The tablet. |
C.The LCD TV. | D.The desktop computer. |
A.Stop using them. | B.Take them apart. |
C.Upgrade them. | D.Recycle them. |
8 . Let's take a minute to think about the water we use. The human body is 60% water and we need to drink lots of water to be healthy. When we are thirsty we just go to the kitchen and fill a glass with clean water.
The truth is that we are lucky enough to have clean water whenever we want,but this is not the case for many people around the world.
A.We use water indirectly too. |
B.Every system in our body depends on water to function. |
C.It is to inspire people to learn more about water-related problems |
D.If children walk many hours a day to get water,they can't go to school. |
E.Did you know that around 750 million people do not have clean water to drink? |
F.In 1993 the United Nations decided that March 22nd is the World Day for Water. |
G.In this way,they know how it feels to walk a long distance carrying heavy bottles. |
On a hot September afternoon, Peter and his friend Isabel were on their way to the library. When they passed by Tubman park, Isabel suggested cutting through it to get to the library. As they entered the park, the sight of the swings (秋千) and the merry-go-round brought back a flood of memories of their childhood spent there. But now everything looked so old, sad, and dirty. Litter lay on the ground next to an overflowing trash bin. There were still young schoolchildren playing there but they had to avoid the trash that littered the playground. A little boy told them that the city took the other trash cans away and the remaining one never got emptied often.
As they headed toward the library, the two high school students wrinkled their forehead. In the library, they encountered Mrs. Evans, their kind-hearted fifth-grade teacher, retired yet still passionate. Mrs. Evans listened as Isabel and Peter eagerly explained what they’d seen. Finally, she recommended them to go to the City Hall to voice their concerns.
The next day, Isabel and Peter went into the building of the City Hall but were met with an impatient officer. They were informed that the city couldn’t help with their problem due to a tight budget. Discouraged, they left and turned to Mrs. Evans for help.
Under her guidance, they decided to ask Go Green, a non-profit organization whose goal is to protect the environment, for help. “This group is good at raising money for projects just like yours, ” said Mrs. Evans. She promised to arrange them to present their ideas to Go Green. Hearing this, their face lit up.
Two main tasks remained ahead: researching ways to clean up the park and preparing a convincing presentation. As Isabel was good at researching while Peter always had a talent for speaking, they cooperated quite well. Isabel learned from a science magazine that a new type of trash bin can squeeze the trash down without being emptied often, which saves time, money, and energy. Based on this, Peter practiced his presentation over and over again.
注意:1. 续写词数应为150左右;2. 请按如下格式在答题卡的相应位置作答。
A week later, Peter stood nervously at the back of the hall where Go Green was meeting.
_______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________After the meeting, Isabel excitedly told Peter the good news.
_______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________Home to the headwaters of the Yangtze, Yellow and Lancang rivers, the Sanjiangyuan area on the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau (青藏高原) is known as “China’s water tower.” It is a
Decades ago, serious environmental degradation (恶化) in Sanjiangyuan,
Over the past years, the ecological environment of the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau
Local residents enjoy the gifts given by nature, and the
Today, as people walk on the vast land of Sanjiangyuan, looking at the expansive mountains, glaciers, lakes and pastures,