1 . Prince William, second in line to the British throne, gave his first TED Talk on Saturday to launch his Earthshot Prize, a competition that will award five £ 1 million prize money every year for the next decade to those who can come up with solutions to environmental problems.
Any person, group or organization around the world is qualified, and any suggestion is welcome, so long as it is applicable globally. It could be a new technology, a new approach, a new governmental policy or any other ideas toward five environmental goals -fixing the climate, purifying the air, protecting nature, cleaning oceans and handling waste.
"Earthshot" was inspired by John F. Kennedy's "Moonshot," an ambitious 1961 mission to get a man on the moon within a decade. The purpose of the prize is partly to arouse excitement and offer what Prince William called “a bit of catalyst, a bit of hope, a bit of positivity" at a time when the world needs. The money will come from donors around the world. The prize committee includes many celebrities.
Prince William has environmental activism in his blue blood. Both his grandfather, and his father Prince Charles were active environmentalists. Prince William acknowledged his heritage by saying he had always listened, learned and believed what they were saying about the environment. Besides speaking wise words, he also puts forward a good prize. Over a million pounds is significantly more than a Nobel Prize and should inspire some serious and creative thinking about the difficulties of Planet Earth. Unlike the Nobel Prize money, the Earthshot money is supposed to be spent on the winning project. “If we achieve these goals, by 2030 our lives won't be worse, and we won't have to sacrifice everything we enjoy. Instead, the way we live will be healthier, cleaner, smarter, and better for all of us," he said.
1. What can be learned about The Earth shot Prize?| A．It will be awarded to Britons. |
| B．It aims to solve social problems. |
| C．It is named after a moon mission. |
| D．It offers £ 50 million in total. |
| A．a method to monitor sea levels |
| B．a new technology to forecast the weather |
| C．a new approach to recycling the waste |
| D．a local government policy to ban fishing |
| A．Encouragement. | B．Alarm. | C．Challenge. | D．Surprise. |
| A．Earthshot Prize equals Nobel Prize. |
| B．Planet Earth will be cleaned by 2030. |
| C．Prince William only talks the talk. |
| D．Prince William is influenced by his family. |
2 . Notpla, a London-based firm, makes a seaweed-based substitute (代替物) for single use plastic packaging. Although some of Notpla’s products are suitable to be eaten, they are designed to be dissolved (溶解) after usage. Made of seaweed instead of a conventional plastic coating, the company’s packaging is fully biodegradable and ideal for use as packaging for kitchen and bathroom supplies like coffee and toilet paper.
According to the United Nations, 331 million kilograms of plastic garbage is produced annually around the world. About 60% of the estimated 9.15 billion tons of plastic produced since the early 1950s has been taken to landfills.
Plastics harm the water, the air, and our bodies. Many experts agree that single-use plastics are unnecessary and dangerous. Some governments and towns in the United States have taken action. New York has banned most plastic shopping bags, while plastic straws have been banned in Miami Beach. Overseas, India stated in August that it plans to place a wide ban on single-use plastics this upcoming summer, with the European Union already implementing this ban.
Seaweed comes in a variety of species and can be harvested or farmed. Notpla uses plants that have been farmed. Rodrigo Garcia Gonzalez and Pierre Paslie, the inventors of Notpla, initially considered seaweed as a solution to the world’s plastic problem for several reasons. Seaweed is plentiful and grows quickly. Additionally it doesn’t compete with land crops and is highly favored for its ability to remove some waste products like carbon from the atmosphere.
In cooperation with the online food ordering service Just Eat, the startup recently tested its product. Last year, the two companies handed out 30, 000 takeaway boxes at various UK restaurants. Plans are in the works to offer the boxes across Europe in 2022. Notpla’s team intends to replace single use plastic in the supply chain more generally as they scale. The company recognizes the difficulty of such a job, considering the volume of plastics consumed around the world.
1. How does the author mainly develop paragraph 2?| A．By presenting figures. | B．By comparing facts. |
| C．By raising questions. | D．By quoting a saying. |
| A．Lifting. | B．Performing. | C．Protesting. | D．Removing. |
| A．The advantages of choosing seaweed. | B．The next goal of the new study. |
| C．The wide use of seaweed. | D．The shortcomings of the plastic bags. |
| A．It will be totally unpractical. | B．It will be richly rewarded. |
| C．It will be a little tough. | D．It will be rather successful. |
The environment pollution was more and more serious today. We have no clean water to drink it because of water pollution. And when trees cut down, some animals disappear. There is more and more dirty smoke in the air. People’s health has been great affected by air, noise and water pollution. Many people have died of diseases causing by pollution. In order to live the better life, it’s time for us to protect our world.
Firstly, we shouldn’t throw away rubbish everywhere. And we should recycle, reduce and reuse things, that saves money and reduces pollution. Use things so long as possible. Don’t use plastic bag. Besides, we must plant more trees and stop people cutting it down. We hope our world will be more and more beautiful.
4 . The Canadian government announced a plan to ban single-use plastics as early as 2022. As someone who performs research on plastic pollution, I see this as a positive step forward. However, I wonder whether it will go far enough.
Some people may feel that this announcement is simply a “feel-good measure” and a distraction from bigger problems such as the climate disaster. The truth of the matter is that plastic pollution and the climate disaster are signs of the same disease. As much as 8% of global oil goes directly to plastic production—a figure that doesn’t include the transportation of single-use plastics to global markets, the energy used to transport plastics to landfills and the energy used to sort or recycle things.
In the past years, some bans have actually resulted in an increase in other forms of waste. For example, paper bags may be seen as a sustainable (可持续的) choice since, unlike plastics, paper breaks down in the environment. However, a paper bag has a carbon footprint three times that of a plastic bag and is still “single-use” just as much as a plastic bag is.
Adopting (采用) a science-based method, which the government has promised, will ensure the ways of using single-use plastics are more sustainable. I’m, however, concerned about the announcement because “as early as 2022” is very different from “by 2022”, which has a strict timeline. If we’re truly going to carry out an effective ban on single-use plastics, our government will need to spend a large amount of money on innovation (改革) and research into sustainable materials and our waste treatment system to prevent plastics from going into our oceans or landfills.
So the question remains: is this announcement simply smoke and mirrors, to hide a lack of determined action on both plastic waste and the climate disaster, or is this a real effort that will be carried out to stop the production of single-use plastics? We will have to wait and see.
1. How does the author feel about Canada’s new plan?| A．She is more excited than worried. | B．She never believes in Canada. |
| C．She considers it a great success. | D．She has mixed feelings about it. |
| A．stress paper bags are sustainable materials |
| B．explain paper bags are greener than plastics |
| C．prove some measures are unsatisfactory |
| D．show paper bags are no different from plastics |
| A．Its coming a little too late. | B．Its lacking scientific support. |
| C．Its having no strict timeline. | D．Its appearing far from practical. |
| A．Canada’s efforts to reduce the use of plastics. |
| B．The author’s views on Canada’s single-use plastic ban. |
| C．Reasons for the author’s criticism of Canada’s new plan. |
| D．Similarities between plastic pollution and the climate disaster. |
But is renting fashion actually more environmentally-friendly than buying it? And if so, how much more? Journalist and author Elizabeth Cline researched this question in a feature article for Elle, and she concluded that it's not as sustainable as it seems.
Take shipping for example, which has to go two ways if an item is rented — receiving and returning. Cline writes that consumer transportation has the second largest carbon footprint of our collective fashion habit after manufacturing.
Then there's the burden of washing, which has to happen for every item when it's returned, regardless of whether or not it was worn. For most renting services, this usually means dry-cleaning, which is a polluting process. All the renting services that Cline looked into have replaced perchloroethylene,a carcinogenic (致癌的) air pollutants that's still used by 70 percent of US dry cleaners, with hydrocarbon (碳氢化合物) alternatives, although these aren't great either. They can produce harmful waste and air pollution if not handled correctly.
Lastly, Cline fears that renting services will increase our appetite for fast fashion, simply because it's so easily accessible. There's something called "share-washing" that makes people have more wasteful behaviors because a product or service is shared and thus is considered more eco-friendly. Uber is one example of this: advertised as a way to share rides and reduce car ownership, and yet it has been proven to discourage walking, bicycling and public transportation use.
Renting clothes is still preferable to buying them cheap and throwing them into the bin after wearing them a few times, but we shouldn't let the availability of these services make us self-satisfied. There's an even better step — and that's wearing what we already have.
1. The underline word in Paragraph 3 most probably means______.| A．traveling by ship | B．selling or renting a ship |
| C．delivering or mailing | D．the cost of sending |
| A．Clothing renting became popular ten years ago. |
| B．Consumer transportation has the largest carbon footprint. |
| C．Renting clothes deserves further consideration. |
| D．Uber is a good example of sharing rides. |
①Renting used clothes ②Buying cheap new clothes and dumping them soon
③Wearing the clothes we have instead of getting more to wear
| A．①>②>③ | B．②>③>① |
| C．③>②>① | D．③>①>② |
| A．Renting fashion-a sustainable choice! | B．Clothes renting or clothes buying? |
| C．Renting services are catching on | D．Clothes renting-truly greener? |
6 . One of the biggest topics of the last decade, sustainability has become the beacon (灯塔) of hope to protect the planet. From supermarkets taking action on plastic packaging to the zero waste movement that can be practised from your kitchen, changes made by individuals and organizations across the globe has had an impact on the way we think, shop and live.
So what does that mean for the world of technology? You’d be forgiven for thinking that the words “sustainable” and “tech” don’t usually go hand in hand.E-waste is, after all, one of the planet’s biggest contributing waste streams. Not only that, but the materials that go into tech products are also part of the problem.
But with a challenge comes an opportunity, and there’s already some brilliant progress happening — great news for those of us wanting to be more sustainable with our tech. Firstly, renewed is having its moment. While consumers would previously turn their noses up at the idea of a second-hand device, there’s been a huge surge in demand for renewed tech. The second major step in tackling the problem of e-waste is a change in attitudes from owning a product to subscribing for one. A subscription for a smartphone might sound like a foreign concept, but it’s already gaining momentum. At the forefront of this movement is London-based tech startup Raylo, a pending B Corp which offers a subscription service for the latest iPhone. As customers aren’t paying to own the phone at the end of their contract, the monthly price is significantly lower than average.
Studies show that extending a phone’s lifespan from one to four years can decrease its environmental impact by about 40%.So the next time it comes to refreshing your device — whether a smartphone, laptop, tablet or something else-consider the more environmentally-friendly options that are at your fingertips.
1. What’s the purpose of paragraph 1?| A．To change the way we think, shop, and live. |
| B．To introduce the topic of sustainability in tech. |
| C．To tell us what people have done to protect the planet. |
| D．To call on people to do something for the environment. |
| A．High-tech products are in short supply. |
| B．E-waste contributes to the biggest waste streams. |
| C．The two sustainability problems in technology. |
| D．Ignoring sustainable technology is unforgivable. |
| A．Oppose. | B．Present. | C．Explain. | D．Accept. |
| A．By upgrading the old one. |
| B．By paying monthly for a smartphone. |
| C．By spending less money on a smartphone. |
| D．By replacing the old one with the latest one. |
7 . Imagine a world without insects. It might sound good at first without creepy-crawly bugs and annoying flies in your apartment. However, the consequences would be disastrous.
The number of insects has dropped by more than half in the past decades, according to British biologist Dave Goulson, author of Silent Earth: Averting the Insect Apocalypse. As insects make up most of the known species on this planet, this data is not good news, The Guardian reported on July 25.
Insects are indeed on the path to extinction, according to the first global scientific review of insect population decline, which was published in the journal Biological Conservation in January 2019. The researchers say intensive agriculture has been the main cause of the decline. Pesticides, in particular, destroy insect habitats. Urbanization and climate change are also significant factors.
“Unless we change our ways of producing food, insects as a whole will go down the path of extinction in a few decades,” the researchers wrote in the review. “The repercussions (影响) this will have for the planet’s ecosystems are catastrophic to say the least.”
What would happen to Earth without insects? It’s almost impossible to predict, but the consequences would be far-reaching. We need insects to pollinate (授粉) crops, recycle plant and animal material, keep the soil healthy and much more. Without insects, many animals would have nothing to eat, and the predators of those animals would go hungry as well. The ecosystem would be thrown off balance.
“If insect species losses cannot be halted, this will have catastrophic consequences for both the planet’s ecosystems and for the survival of mankind,” said Francisco Sanchez-Bayo at the University of Sydney, Australia, one of the authors of the review.
The first step to halting this process is “to engender a society that values the natural world, both for what it does for us and for its own sake”, Goulson suggests. “The obvious place to start is with our children, encouraging environmental awareness from an early age.”
1. What does the underlined word “disastrous” in paragraph 1 probably mean?| A．Highly helpful. | B．Very interesting. |
| C．Extremely terrible. | D．Impossible to predict. |
| A．Problems with intensive agriculture. |
| B．Causes of the decline in the insect population. |
| C．Factors causing insect habitat loss. |
| D．Influence of urbanization on insects. |
| A．They help slow down climate change. |
| B．They reduce the number of predators. |
| C．They have a great impact on the ecosystem. |
| D．They keep the soil dry and healthy. |
| A．Exploring the natural world often. |
| B．Providing insects with enough food. |
| C．Taking children to watch insects closely. |
| D．Raising public awareness of natural protection. |
8 . Why Is Sorting Important When Recycling?
We all agree that we should recycle more at home, in the office or when out and about.
Once recyclable materials are collected from your home, they are further sorted in specialized facilities which ensure the quality of the recycling process.
| A．For effective recycling we need effective sorting. |
| B．Packaging at work is the first step towards recycling. |
| C．This is where different sorting techniques come into play. |
| D．So citizens need to be aware of their local collection system. |
| E．Collection systems can be very different from country to country. |
| F．The rest was landfilled or burned even though they could have been recycled or reused. |
| G．But for materials to be recycled, they first need to find their way to the right waste stream. |
9 . The early life of the green sea turtle (海龟) is full of danger. Only one in 1,000 baby sea turtles survive to adulthood (成年). From its home in the sand, it breaks its egg with an egg tooth. Its mother is not there to help it. Instead, it is greeted by crabs, coyotes, and dogs waiting to eat it for dinner. To survive, the baby turtle must hide in the sand until night. Then, it moves slowly to the sea.
The small turtle must swim hard to reach the ocean waters. In the sea, it tries hard to find food. It must also keep itself from being food for fish.
As dangerous as the sea turtle’s life is in the natural world, its most dangerous enemies are humans. The rubbish left by humans in the ocean causes problems for the small green sea turtle. A little turtle might eat a piece of plastic (塑料) in the sea. It might also eat oil on the ocean’s surface. Young turtles also get caught in fishing nets. There are laws against hunting sea turtles. Still, many are hunted, both for their meat and for their shells (壳). All of these dangers must be prevented.
Sea turtles that do survive to grow into adulthood go through many changes. For example, adult green sea turtles weigh about 500 pounds. They stop eating jellyfish and other meat and eat only plants. And they may plan a trip to go back home again. A mother sea turtle goes back to the beach where she was born. This is the only place where she will lay eggs. Even if it has been forty years since she was a baby, she always knows her way back home.
1. Why do baby turtles move to the sea at night?| A．They dislike sunshine. |
| B．They prefer lower temperatures. |
| C．They can find food easily then. |
| D．They need to avoid enemies. |
| A．Pitiful. | B．Careless. |
| C．Interesting. | D．Courageous. |
| A．They mainly feed on fish and meat. |
| B．They always produce eggs at their birthplaces. |
| C．They can live for around forty years. |
| D．They visit their beach homes several times a year. |
| A．The homes of green sea turtles. |
| B．How sea turtles find their food. |
| C．The dangers faced by sea turtles. |
| D．How young turtles become adults. |
1．垃圾的现状和危害；
2．说明处理垃圾的办法：分类放进不同的垃圾桶里；提高环保意识；
3．自己的看法。
注意:1.词数120左右，开头结尾已经为你写好(不计入总词数);
2.可适当增加细节，以使行文连贯。
参考词汇：垃圾 rubbish
分类放进不同的垃圾桶里 put into different dustbins
提高环保意识 raise awareness of environmental protection
Dear editor,
______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
Yours sincerely,
Li Hua
