A small town in England is teaching the world that it is important
2 . The endangered pandas in the Qinling Mountains might face a new threat: the loss of their food—bamboo, which makes up 99% of their meals.
Adult pandas spend most part of the day eating bamboo and have to take in at least 40 pounds a day to stay healthy. However, a new study published in Nature Climate Change warned that they may soon find their food gone because most of the bamboo in the Qinling Mountains might disappear by the end of the century as a result of the rising temperature worldwide.
A team made up of researchers from Michigan State University and the Chinese Academy of Sciences has studied the effects of climate change on the bamboo in the Qinling Mountains. They have found that bamboo is very sensitive to climate change. “80% to 100% of the bamboo would be gone if the average temperature increases 3.5 degrees worldwide by the end of the century,” said Liu Jianguo, one of the report’s authors.
He added, “This is how much the temperature would rise by 2100 even if all countries will keep their promises in The Paris Agreement. But you know what is happening around the world.”
In recent years, China has been trying its best to protect the endangered pandas by setting up more and bigger nature reserves.
“But it is far from being enough and the endangered pandas need cooperation from the rest of the world, because their future is not just in the hands of the Chinese,” said Shirley Martin from the World Wildlife Fund but not a member of the team.
There are about 260 pandas in the Qinling Mountains. That is about 13% of the China’s wild panda population. In addition, about 375 are living in research centers and zoos in China.
1. What can we learn from the first paragraph?| A．The Qinling Mountains can provide enough bamboo for the pandas. |
| B．Pandas in the Qinling Mountains are only threatened by the loss of food. |
| C．Lots of the bamboo in the Qinling Mountains will probably disappear. |
| D．Pandas have already eaten 99% of the bamboo in the Qinling Mountains. |
| A．China needs more help from the World Wildlife Fund. |
| B．It is difficult to control the temperature rise within 3.5℃. |
| C．Bamboo is sensitive to changes in temperature. |
| D．China is making great efforts to protect the pandas. |
| A．About 260. | B．About 635. |
| C．About 2, 635. | D．About 2, 000. |
| A．The Disappearance of Bamboo |
| B．Necessity to Change Pandas’ Food |
| C．A New Threat Faced by the Pandas |
| D．Efforts Made to Save Pandas |
3 . In the far corner of the front yard of a large house in Florida rests an RV—Recreational Vehicle (活动房屋式旅游车), shaded by trees as clothing on a nearby line sways (摇动) in the breeze. In this RV, the National Geographic explorer Thomas Culhane lives with his wife, Enas, almost entirely off the grid—a lifestyle without depending on electricity supply.
Culhane began living off the grid in the late 1990s, when he went into the basement of his apartment building in Los Angeles and pulled out the plug that delivered electricity. Even earlier though, he was first inspired by sustainable living during a trip in 1970 to visit his relatives. He was eight years old and worried that his stay in their small village was going to be miserable because his relatives told him they had no air conditioning or electricity — but they had plenty of fresh fruits from orchards (果园) and lots of cold drinks chilled by the icy stream from the ice caps of the nearby mountain. “That was amazing,” says Culhane.
He met Enas when she was living in an ecovillage in Portugal. Enas said she liked the feeling of being low impact, and being harmless to the earth. Culhane was attracted and fell in love with her. The couple got married, living on the same property that they currently have. They moved into their first home together—an RV which they immediately took completely off-grid.
Inside their RV, Culhane and Enas have hot showers, a working gas stove, a refrigerator, a washing machine and a big screen TV. They use gas created by their on-site biodigesters (生物煮解器) to cook on a gas-powered stove. They also use energy created by the biodigesters to heat their bath water. They feed the biodigesters using their own food waste—at no additional cost to the earth.
Sometimes on weekends, the RV is turned into a classroom. The couple host workshops to let the community members and students know living an off-grid life is getting easier and teach them how to respect and coexist (共存) peacefully with the environment.
1. What does the author intend to do in paragraph 2?| A．Add some background information. |
| B．Summarize the previous paragraph. |
| C．Provide some advice for the readers. |
| D．Introduce a new topic for discussion. |
| A．Her marriage property. |
| B．Their common life belief. |
| C．The beauty of her ecovillage. |
| D．Her experience of exploration. |
| A．Food waste. |
| B．The additional cost. |
| C．Greenhouse gases. |
| D．Alternative (可供替代的) energy. |
| A．An RV Classroom |
| B．Living off the Grid |
| C．Getting Close to Nature |
| D．Protecting the Environment |
4 . Each winter, an army of ice, fishermen move onto frozen (结冰的) lakes. After digging a hole, through the ice, they all hope to land a tasty dinner. But within just a decade, many dozens of northern lakes are no longer frozen all winter long. That number may jump to thousands within 70 years.
When lakes warm too much, things then worsen in summer. “At sea and on land，many species respond to warming environments by moving to cooler ones,” says R. Iestyn Woolway. He’s a scientist. He says, “In lakes, the only place is deeper, cooler water. However, deeper water is often oxygen-poor.” Soon, he worries, lakes may warm to a situation where there is nowhere for the fish to go.
To find out when this is likely to happen, his team used a computer to model the likely influences of summer heat on 702 lakes throughout a 200-year span, starting from 1901. According to the model, the average (平均的) temperature of lake heatwaves (酷热期) will increase about 3.7 to 5.4 degrees Celsius. And such lake heatwaves will last more than three months by 2099. In 1901, the average was only one week.
That may make the water more comfortable for people to swim in, but many fish and other creatures won’t like it. As water temperatures rise, the number of species will decrease greatly, Woolway says. Weather patterns also will change. That will lead to increased rainfall in some regions and changes of local air temperatures in others, he adds.
Gretchen Hansen is a fisheries ecologist. She points out that each study is important in under-standing how warming lakes are likely to affect fish and other water creatures. “We should be working hard to protect lakes for fish communities and drinking water,” she says. To achieve that, she argues, “We should do everything we can to move towards a CO2-free economy within the next decade.”
1. What will happen to northern lakes in the near future?| A．They will be polluted by garbage. |
| B．They will become ice-free in winter. |
| C．They will dry up due to climate change. |
| D．They will be covered with thick ice and snow. |
| A．It may cause species to fight with each other. |
| B．It can lead to overfishing in northern lakes. |
| C．It will change summer into a hotter season. |
| D．It may make fish unable to survive. |
| A．Lake heatwaves are likely to be more serious. |
| B．Global lakes will be influenced by summer heat. |
| C．Lake heatwaves can only be noticed during a long time. |
| D．Human activities play a role in increasing lake temperatures. |
| A．The difficulty in dealing with climate change. |
| B．The ways of reducing water temperatures. |
| C．The influences of warming water. |
| D．The causes of natural disasters. |
5 . Flying someone one-way from London to New York City produces a lot of climate-warming greenhouse gas. But there is a new way to cut the climate influence of flying. Most planes crossing the Atlantic Ocean follow one of several fixed paths that are widely spaced. “Instead of having these fixed tracks which keep the planes apart, airlines can fly much more flexible routes (灵活的路线),” says Cathie Wells. She is a PhD student in mathematics.
The aviation industry knows it has a high carbon footprint (碳排放量). To reduce that footprint, some people share their ideas. For instance, experts could redesign planes. Or airlines could choose fuels (燃料)from renewable sources, such as plants. But it takes decades and many billions of dollars to design, test and fly new planes and try new fuels.
Taking more flexible routes, in contrast, can cut costs and energy right away. “Reducing fuel use is a win-win solution,” says Irene Dedoussi, who works at Delft University of Technology. It allows the aviation industry to save money on fuels while reducing carbon footprints. “Even savings of just one or two percent are generally considered important. Using something so simple to cut fuel use by one sixth is huge,” she said. Before that can happen, however, Wells needs to make a few changes. The researchers of her team will have to work out the best flight paths that consider scheduling issues.
National Air Traffic Services (NATS) provides air-traffic control for the United Kingdom. It invited Wells to describe her new findings. Just one week after her team’s new study was published, NATS said it would change its flight-paths system. For now, NATS will be working with airlines to allow them to choose routes that would best limit their fuel use.
1. What is Cathie Wells’ way to cut the climate influence of flying?| A．Making changes to flight paths. |
| B．Changing the design of planes. |
| C．Using environment-friendly fuels. |
| D．Improving the pilots’ driving skills. |
| A．They require dangerous experiments. |
| B．They are not supported by the public. |
| C．They take a lot of time and can be costly. |
| D．They are unable to reduce carbon footprints to the lowest. |
| A．It brings better service to passengers. |
| B．It is helpful in reducing traffic jams. |
| C．It has little influence on the aviation industry. |
| D．It has big advantages but needs careful consideration. |
| A．A solution to traffic problems. |
| B．The growing interest in the study of planes. |
| C．The influence of air travel on the environment. |
| D．A new way to make future air travel greener. |
Located up to 4,600 meters above sea level, Hoh Xil, or Kekexili, is China’s largest and the world’s third largest uninhabited area. The view of mountains, glaciers and lakes all in the same area makes
At the 41st session of the UNESCO World Heritage Committee
Now that Hoh Xil has made it onto the UNESCO list, it’s believed that the protection of the region’s wild animals and special ecosystem will be
7 . The roads that wind along the Seine used to be full of heavy traffic. Today, cyclists are enjoying the waterside peace. On the right bank opposite the Eiffel Tower, cars have been made to travel in a single lane (车道), leaving the other to bicycles.
A sense of being controlled is felt by the capital’s car owners. Anne Hidalgo, the Socialist mayor of Paris, is starting “a war against cars”.
As part of the city hall’s plan to increase the share of trips taken by bicycle from 5% to 15% by 2020, protected cycling lanes are being lengthened along some of the city’s main roads. A whole road on the busy Rue de Rivoli is being changed into a twoway bike route.The left bank’s road was closed to cars in 2013, six years after the city made a bikesharing plan.
“Paris is not anticar, but antipollution,” says JeanLouis Missika, the head of planning at city hall.Pollution levels in the city are especially high.With its narrow streets，the government is trying its best to reduce (减少) cars that do not carry passengers. Fully 80% of cars running in central Paris carry only one person, and 79% of those on its roads are privately owned.BlaBlaCar, a French ridesharing startup, recently introduced BlaBlaLines, a new app produced to help people who travel to and from work share cars.
The war against cars started by Ms Hidalgo is also a rethink of how the city should start an age that will be shaped by electric cars and driverless transport. “It will be as great as the change from horsedrawn carriages (马车) to cars,” says Mr Missika. He expects to see the first driverless sixperson taxis in Paris next year, and says that city hall will ban (禁止) privately owned cars in the centre by 2025-2030.
1. What does Paragraph 1 try to show?| A．The modern life of Paris. |
| B．The heavy traffic in Paris. |
| C．The great scenery of Paris. |
| D．The reduction of cars in Paris. |
| A．To avoid car accidents. |
| B．To encourage bike riding. |
| C．To make people live a comfortable life. |
| D．To show the importance of public transport. |
| A．It has closed some narrow streets. |
| B．It has banned privately owned cars. |
| C．It discourages cars without passengers. |
| D．It encourages public transport journeys. |
| A．He is uncertain about it. |
| B．He has high hopes for it. |
| C．He is against it. |
| D．He doubts it. |
8 . Desertification (沙漠化) is a course that has caused much concern over the past few years — and it’s a major problem for the ancient land of Egypt, where 96% of the country’s land is desert.
So why is it that — if you drove a car 10 miles west of the Suez Canal — you would see a large number of forests outlined against the orange sand and blue sky of the Sahara?
The Serapium Forest is the richest of Egypt’s 36 areas that make up a program to fight desertification by creating sustainably managed commercial forests fed completely by wastewater. The 500-mile forest is only a short distance from the 400, 000 people living in the Egyptian city of Ismailia, who produce millions of tons of wastewater every year.
After a dozen-mile journey to the Serapium Forest, the wastewater is then stored underground where oxygen is fed in to speed up the bacterial purification process. A system of pipes then spreads the wastewater throughout the forest. And human wastewater is still rich in chemicals even after being treated.
The government’s effort, called the National Program for Safe Use of Treated Sewage Water for Afforestation is going a long way toward achieving the country’s goals voiced in the 1992 UN Rio conference on climate change.
The research was supported by ForestFinance, a German company that has already planted near-natural forests in Panama and Vietnam to help those countries with their development and wildlife protection. ForestFinance wants to increase the number of species grown in Serapium by including a forest on the site. That way, the biodiversity (生物多样性) of the commercial forest would be able to support a greater number of species, and hopefully bring in money as well. Although the Serapium Forest faces a lot of difficulties, it’s still growing — a 500-acre green wall to join the others in the world in preventing the sands of the world’s deserts from spreading.
1. What is the purpose of the first paragraph?| A．To voice a different idea. |
| B．To present research findings. |
| C．To offer background information. |
| D．To introduce a problem-solving approach. |
| A．It was built by the people of Ismailia. |
| B．It was planted to fight climate change. |
| C．It is in danger of being destroyed. |
| D．It is the smallest forest in Egypt. |
| A．The influence of green space on cities. |
| B．The value of the newly-founded Serapium Forest. |
| C．The way of using wastewater to feed the Serapium Forest. |
| D．The preparation for the government setting up the program. |
| A．It raises serious doubts. |
| B．It will bring great benefits. |
| C．It has been going smoothly. |
| D．It encourages the government to take action. |
9 . A team of scientists says that playing sounds underwater can get fish to return to areas with severely damaged coral reefs(珊瑚礁).
In an experiment, they found fish returned after hearing recordings of the sounds of a healthy ocean reef. The scientists placed underwater speakers in areas where coral had been dying in Australia’s northern Great Barrier Reef. They played the sounds over a period of about six weeks in 2017 and studied the results. The team reported that twice as many fish arrived in areas where the sounds of healthy coral were played. The sounds also led to a 50 percent increase in the number of species present in the area, the researchers found. Among the arriving fish were species that feed on all major food sources.
The researchers noted the importance of having many different kinds of fish return to the area. Different species of fish perform many activities that support the ocean environment and sea life. “Damaged reefs have a higher chance of recovery if they have healthy fish populations,” the scientists wrote in the report.
Steve Simpson is a professor at the University of Exeter who helped lead the research. He said in a statement that “healthy coral reefs are remarkably noisy places”. They contain the sounds of many kinds of shrimp, fish and other sea creatures. Young fish listen for these sounds when they are looking for a place to settle, Simpson said.
He added that reefs “become ghostly quiet” when they suffer destruction that is usually related to human-caused pollution. Coral damage can cause unappealing smells and sounds that drive shrimp and fish away. But the experiment suggested that the use of underwater loudspeakers was an effective way to get young fish to come back.
Andy Radford, a professor at University of Bristol, said the underwater sounds are a promising way to fight coral reef damage at the local community level. But he noted that other threats need to be, reduced as well. These include climate change, pollution and overfishing.
1. What does the underlined “they” (Para.4) refer to?| A．The sounds. | B．The corals reefs. | C．The young fish. | D．The researchers. |
| A．Healthy fish help recover the damaged coral reefs by swimming. |
| B．People reduce environmental pollution to save dying coral. |
| C．Scientists find a new way to protect the ocean environment and sea life. |
| D．Researchers use underwater sounds to fight coral reef damage. |
| A．Twice as many fish arrived in the healthy coral areas. |
| B．The sounds led to a 50 percent increase in the number of fish present in the area. |
| C．Playing the sounds of healthy coral reefs is effective to save dying coral. |
| D．Damaged reef scan recover completely if they have healthy fish populations. |
| A．Human-caused pollution. | B．The unattractive smells and sounds. |
| C．Climate change. | D．Overfishing. |
10 . Do you know that the oldest tree is a 5, 000-year old bristlecone pine (狐尾松) located in the forests of Nevada? Unfortunately, many of these precious old-growth trees are starting to disappear from our planet. The term old-growth refers to trees that are 150 years or older. This means that many of the trees on the Earth today are younger, smaller, and have shorter lifespans.
As the Earth’s temperature warms up due to climate change, it is having unintended effects on the world’s forests. When temperatures rise, trees close their pores (气孔) to prevent the loss of moisture, and this, in turn, slows down the process of photosynthesis (光合作用). As a result, these trees are shorter and grow slowly, as well as have a high deathrate. Climate change also increases the possibility of droughts and wildfires. After wildfires, it takes a while for the forest ecosystems to recover, and in some cases, the forests are lost permanently. Trees that are stressed are also susceptible (易受影响的) to attacks by bacteria (细菌). Finally, humans have changed the forest landscape through logging (伐木).
There are some who claim that increased greenhouse gas emission is helping trees grow faster because CO2, is needed for photosynthesis. While some younger trees may benefit from this, we are seeing significantly more loss of forests than gain.
Old-growth forests are a storehouse of carbon, and when they die, the stored CO2, is released into the air worsening the greenhouse effect. Older forests have higher biodiversity, which is beneficial as each organism has a role to play and there is a wide variety of species. As these forests disappear, species that once called them “home” are forced to relocate, affecting the biodiversity of those ecosystems. Unfortunately, some endangered species are unable to adapt and go extinct.
With trees dying continuously, will future generations miss out on the wonders of forests?
1. What is the main idea of the second paragraph?| A．Why bacteria may attack old trees. | B．What leads to the rising temperatures. |
| C．Why old-growth forests are disappearing. | D．How global warming causes natural disasters. |
| A．Species. | B．Older forests. | C．Organisms. | D．Roles organisms play. |
| A．a doubt | B．a warning | C．a blame | D．a suggestion |
| A．To urge people to reduce gas emission. | B．To explain the greenhouse effect on trees. |
| C．To introduce the process of photosynthesis. | D．To call on people to protect old-growth trees. |
