1 . How Can We Make Singles Day Greener?

After the Singles Day, nearly 490 million packages were delivered every day. As more people prefer online shopping, the amount of waste generated has become a matter of concern.     1     Consumers share their opinions.

Regulations can be put in place but self-awareness would be better. Recycled material should be used as much as possible, which can break down easily.     2    Therefore, Product makers urgently need to improve their technology of product packaging. What’s more, green packaging is urgently needed in the market.

    3    

As consumers, we can make a difference by acting responsibly toward the environment. Buy naked groceries or keep the grocery packaging for other purpose before they’re thrown away. Always keep in mind that it is the consciousness of reusing the packaging that counts.

Environmental stress caused by packaging and rolls of tape for express delivery goods is severe. It’s necessary to deliver the goods with package instructions.    4     When lacking enough packaging instructions, the packaging cannot be recycled or reused and the tape is simply abandoned.

Policies and regulations should be introduced to ensure that packaging will be recycled and reused. Meanwhile, a recycling system needs to be established where the e-commerce platforms, delivery companies and consumers can engage in the green packaging campaign.    5    In addition, tax preference can also be offered for the packaging recycling and reusing toward the e-commerce platform and express companies.

2 . UK supermarkets are producing more plastic waste despite promises to cut down, new re-search suggests, as sales of bags for life increase to 1.5 billion.

Retailers (零售商)were responsible for more than 900,000 tons of plastic waste in 2018, according to a report from the Environmental Investigation Agency (EIA) released Thursday. Seven of the 10 largest supermarket chains reported a higher plastic packaging tonnage in 2019 compared to last year, although exact figures for this year have not been released.

Compared to 2018, this year the number of sold eco-friendly bags for life rose by about 25%, the report stated. Campaigners said the rise showed that the bags are now being used by many as a replacement for single-use carrier bags.

Campaigners recommend that supermarkets increase the price of bags for life to 70 pence ($0.9). They point to the 90% reduction in bags for life sales in Ireland, where prices are set at 70 cents ($0.77). However, in an ideal world bags for life would be removed completely, enforced by a government ban, said campaigners.

“It's shocking to see that despite unprecedented (空前的)awareness of the pollution crisis, the amount of single-use plastic used by the UK's biggest supermarkets has actually increased in the past year,” said Juliet Phillips, EIA ocean campaigner. He added, “Our survey shows that grocery retailers need to tighten up targets to drive real reductions in single use packaging and items. We need to address our throwaway culture at it's root through systems change, not materials change. Substituting one single-use material for another is not the solution.”

The report reveals that plastic use among suppliers is also to blame, and supermarkets have failed to make them reduce plastic packaging. Tesco has led the way in this area, threatening to delist (退市)products for suppliers who fail to cut excessive plastic. Campaigners are urging other supermarkets to do the same.

Plastic waste is a global issue and various countries have taken action to reduce its impact.

3 . The Colorado River is the lifeblood of the American Southwest. It supplies water to more than 36 million people, has changed the desert into farmland, and allows cities like Los Angeles, Phoenix, and Las Vegas to develop. But satisfying the region’s need for water has come at a price.

The river once traveled all the way from Colorado’s Rocky Mountains to the Gulf of California. Now, dams (水坝) control the river’s water for human use. As a result, the river no longer reaches the ocean. Without water, the delta (三角洲) at the river’s mouth has become dry and poor.

To bring the delta back to life, engineers recently opened the Morelos Dam near the US-Mexico border to free a temporary burst of water. This pulse flow allowed the Colorad River to reach the sea for the first time in 16 years, helping the river’s delta come alive.

The dams built by the US government form a system of man-made lakes. These lakes can store four times the river’s yearly flow. “The lakes are like the river basin’s bank accounts,” says Taylor Hawes. “They provide a place to save up water for not-so-rainy days — like right now”.

In wetter times, on and off since the 1960s, the Colorado managed to complete its journey to the sea. During those rare times, spring floods temporarily brought life back to the delta. Seeing the difference a little water could make gave scientists the idea for this year’s pulse flow.

“Just add water and you get an amazing recovery,” says Eloise Kendy. “The project serves as a model of how to manage rivers sustainably (可持续) for both people and nature. A lot of rivers in the West have problems. We used them to make the deserts bloom and build cities. We didn’t think about the environment. But it’s possible to restore them. If we can do it in the Colorado River Delta, we can do it anywhere.”

5 . Balancing preservation of the land with our desire to travel is a challenge for us travelers. When seeing cities face constant resource and waste problems, I couldn’t help but think about how much travel can affect the environment.

Back in my youth, I was an environmental activist. But over the years, I leave the lights on. I fly a lot. I drink out of plastic bottles. I eat a lot of meat. And I love fish, especially tuna. However, recently, I’ve begun thinking harder about how travel affects the environment and how I affect the environment. In doing so, I’ve tried to be a lot more aware of my actions.

I don’t know if there is an easy solution for this problem. The most environmentally friendly activity is not to travel at all, but that’s unrealistic and too extreme. There’s so much money in travel that I don’t think the government and regulation can do much. Only when their profits are hurt will hotels, operators, and the industry as a whole begin to listen. Instead, it’s all about the consumers. The only good way is to get people to be more environmentally conscious and make better decisions.

Consumers have a lot of power. Why did Wal-Mart start selling only sustainable fish and whole milk? Consumers wanted it. I think if we as travelers begin to demand more environmentally friendly practices and avoid companies with poor environmental records, we can change things.

Now, I recycle more, I use fewer water bottles, I shut off the lights, Most importantly, I use operators and stay at places that are reducing their environmental impact.

Travel can destroy the environment but it doesn’t have to. We have the power to make things better. We can do small things and demand more of the places we stay and visit. We can and should demand more of places, and of ourselves.

6 . A few weeks ago, I bought a locally-grown salad from a vending machine(自动售货机). But then I immediately realized that it was packaged in a plastic jar. ''I guess I live with this jar now and forever. '' I thought sadly as I stared down at my new child.

The salad jar was only the latest in a long line of examples of how I am addicted to the responsibility of reusing everything, trying to never throw anything away. Water bottles have been given second lives, and berry containers are transformed into Tupperware. I recently even looked at a plastic straw in my fruit juice: Could I reuse it too…?

Yet trying to squeeze my salad jar under my kitchen counter this weekend, I finally had to admit: Being an environmentalist has turned me into a hoarder(囤积者). While keeping a certain number of jars and vegetable bags will allow me not to buy new containers, at a certain point those 30 berry containers begin to get a bit unnecessary. Who am I kidding? Then one day I came across a blog post that asks accusingly. ''Are you turning your own home into a landfill(垃圾填埋场)? ''

In my defense, there is absolutely no excuse not to be a conscious consumer. The solution is painfully obvious, but hard to admit: Delaying waste is not, in fact, rejecting waste. In an over-packaged, over-consuming culture, this can feel like a burden. While I refuse to throw away packaging, the fact remains: I already have it. The damage is done. I've been ignoring one of the most essential and difficult parts—reduce, reuse, recycle. Even if I go out of my way to reuse the waste I do have, I need to reduce what I am bringing home in the first place.

While I might not be ready to go full zero-waste, it's a goal that is admirable to work toward. Until then, my salad jar child is going to make a great overnight oats jar.

8 . The UK will ban all new petrol and diesel-powered vehicles from its roads beginning in 19 years for environmental reasons, a government report says.

The plan aims to start removing petrol and diesel engines in 2040. It follows a similar official statement in France and comes after the British government was ordered by the High Court to develop new plans to reduce NO2 in the air. Judges ruled that previous clean-air plans were not enough to meet European Union pollution limits in the coming years.

The British government has said the poor air quality has an unnecessary and avoidable negative effect on citizens’ health, and costs up to $3.5 billion in annual lost productivity.

Part of the new plan involves an offer of $260 million to local governments to change rules where vehicle emissions (排放量) are over EU standards. Ideas so far include changing road layouts, reprogramming traffic lights and charging a fee for the oldest and most polluting cars on the road.

The plan also includes $1.3 billion for government purchase of extreme-low-emission vehicles, nearly $130 million to improve infrastructure for electric vehicle charging stations and $378 million for remodeling existing vehicles.

Climate change is also a reason for the plan to get these vehicles off the road. “We can’t carry on with petrol and diesel cars,” Environment Secretary Michael Gove said. “It’s important that we all prepare for a significant change which deals not just with the problems of health caused by emissions, but the broader problems caused in terms of accelerating climate change.”

Gove added that local communities are partly responsible for coming up with ways to limit emissions, including possible limitations on commuters (上下班往返的人) and the addition of cleaner mass transportation options. Local leaders are called on to draw up “appropriate plans” to deal with climate challenges related to emissions, he said.

9 . Rainbow -coloured rubbish is the colourful waste created by a Swedish city with a unique recycling system. Like many cities in Sweden, Eskilstuna has an impressive recycling record. It met the EU’ s 2020 target of recycling 50％ of waste many years ago. But almost everyone who lives here follows a strict recycling policy at home. People are expected to sort their household waste into seven separate categories, including food, textiles, cartons and metal. But what really makes the system stand out is the bright colour code.

The reason for this becomes clear at the city’ s recycling plant. The bags arrive all jumbled up because they’ re collected altogether, once a fortnight from outside people’ s houses. But thanks to those bright colours, scanners can select the bags and separate them efficiently. The food waste in green bags is processed on site into slurry(浆) to make biogas, which powers the city’ s buses. One of the benefits of this method of recycling is that there is less cross-pollution,so more of the recycled waste can actually be used to make new things.

Like the rest of Sweden, Eskilstuna is committed to sending zero waste from its citizens to landfill(垃圾堆) . Waste that cannot be recycled is incinerated at a local plant to generate electricity. This reduces reliance on fossil fuels, but does create greenhouse gases. As countries a-round the world try to improve their recycling rates, some may look to Eskilstuna as an example to follow— as long as they think they can persuade their citizens to get busy sorting at home.

10 . A society that lives by the plastic fork may very well die from it. That's how things are looking. Anyway,for a world so used to disposable（一次性的） habits, any hope for a solution(解决方案) also increasingly seems to be buried.

Sure, there have been some hopeful ideas.   Boyan Slat, the Dutch inventor developed a plan for Covering the Great Pacific Garbage Patch. Not long after it started, Slat's system experienced "material fatigue(疲劳)"-likely the result of being strained(使受到压力) by all that trash-and the task was delayed.

AlI the while, the plastic increases. Its growth is very fast, according to Linda Wang, a professor of chemical engineering at Purdue University. She says, "We'II have more plastic than fish by 2050. " Yet Wang, along with other researchers at Purdue, may have a solution not only to this plastic problem, but also to the growing need for clean energy.   Her team has developed a system that turns waste, a durable, lightweight material that accounts for about a quarter of all plastic waste, into a highly pure form of gasoline.

Publishing their findings in the journal Sustainable Chemistry and Engineering, the scientists state that instead of making plastic go away, they can break it down and reuse it, using chemistry to destroy what chemistry brought to the world when plastic was developed back in 1907.

The process uses "supercritical" water-heated to around 450 degrees celsius(842 degrees Fahrenheit),beyond the key point at which distinct liquid and vapor phases(气液态) exist-to boil plastic waste into an oil,the researchers explain. It takes a couple of hours for the supercritical water to complete the transformation, but the result is a kind of oil that can be used as gasoline or fuel. It can also be turned into other products.

The researchers have only made the transformation in a laboratory setting so far, but they suggest turning the process to a commercial scale（规模） may not be far off. And considering the 300 million tons of plastic into the environment every year, that day can't come soon enough. But it will come in time.