公共英语等级考试三级(PETS3)学习笔记(二)

1、公共英语等级考试三级(PETS3)学习笔记（二）Unit 4 EnvironmentPhrases and Sentences:1、He is famous for vigorously opposing the use of chemicals to kill pets.PS:解析vigorously opposing 并翻译这句话。=>vigorously opposing积极反对全句翻译：他因为积极反对用化学品杀宠物而出名。2、What would you recommend for a tenth-grader?PS:解析tenth-grader到底是十年级的学生，还是十岁的小孩

2、?=>tenth-grade是“十年级”，所以tenth-grader当然是“十年纪的学生”了。十岁的小孩是：teenager3、They used Singapore as a microcosm for examining a regionwide tropical biodiversity crisis,and compiled population data from the past two centuries.PS:翻译这句话。=>他们用新加坡作为检查热带地区的区域性的生活差异危机一个缩影，并用过去两个世纪(的历史)来编纂人口数据。其中biodiversity是由前缀b

3、io-和diversity组合而成的，意思是生命的差异性。4、Animals that call the forest home have suffered enormously.PS:翻译这句话，重点解析"call"在这句话的意思。=>call称为，当作。全句翻译：以森林为家的动物们受到了巨大的灾难。5、American and Europe will pool research into hydrogen-powered fuel cells.PS:翻译这句话，重点解析"pool"在这句话的意思。=>pool集中投入，pool的名词意思是

4、“池塘”，动词本义是“汇合成塘”的意思，这里用的是比喻义，想象一下不难理解的。全句翻译：美国和欧洲将集中注资到氢燃料电池的研究中。6、It shows the United States is out to make peace with eco-friendly Europe.PS:翻译这句话=>这表明美国将尽力与生态环境好的欧洲和平相处。out这里是副词，表示“致力于”。7、Fuel cells create electricity by combining oxygen and hydrogen without producing harmful emissions, and te

5、chnical construction poses few basic challenges.PS:翻译这句话，重点解析"call"在这句话的意思。=>燃料电池通过氧气和氢气反应来发电而不发出有害物质，并且在技术的组建上提出了很少的挑战。这里没有call,只有cell,是电池的意思，名词。pose challenge提出挑战，就是指技术上的难关。8、But opinion is sharply divided over how to obtain hydrogen without wasting more natural resources.PS:翻译这句话，重点解

6、析"over"在这句话的意思。=>但是在如何不浪费更多自然资源的情况下获得氢气这个问题上，意见出现了分歧。其中的over相当于on,就是“关于”的意思。9、That means making use of renewable resources for the task, say wind and solar resources.PS:翻译这句话，重点解析"say"在这句话的意思。=>那意味着该任务是要利用可再生资源，比如风能和太阳能。其中的say是副词，比如，相当于for example.10、Whitman assured the pub

7、lic that the air was safe before testing was conclusive. In addition, all EPA statements were required to be screened by the White House.PS:翻译这句话=>惠特曼向公众保证在测试下结论之前空气是安全的。而且，所有的EPA(美国环保署)申明都要求经过白宫的筛选。screen：动词，筛选/过滤。11、But New York Sen.(senator,参议员。)Hillary Clinton is calling for an investigation,

8、 saying somebody surely leaned on the EPA to lie, which Whitman strongly denies.PS:翻译这句话=>但是纽约的科学家希拉里.克林顿要求调查此事，说某些人明显的偏向于EPA(美国环保署)而说谎，对于这个，惠特曼坚决否认。call for:相当于demand,require，lean on:偏向于。Passage:When it comes to air pollution, the simple life isnt necessarily the safest. The most poisonous atmos

9、phere in Asia is found not in rapidly modernizing cities like New Delhi or Beijing but inside the kitchens of homes in rural Asia. Millions of families in the countryside heat their abodes and cook with open fires using cheap fuels that belch carbon monoxide and other noxious fumes at level up to 50

10、0 times international safety limits. Rural women and children often spend hours each day in poorly, ventilated kitchens, breathing this putrid air. “This is a problem that has been around forever, as long as humankind has existed, but its been ignored,” says Eva Rehfuess, a World Health Organization

11、 expert on indoor air pollution. “If you walked into these kitchens, your eyes would start tearing and you would find it difficult to breathe. Its terrible. ”The WHO estimates that indoor air pollution cause 1.6 million deaths per year in developing countries around the world, up to 555,000 of which

12、 occur in India alone-and overwhelmingly its the poor who are dying. Villagers have no choice but to use wood, coal or dung fires, raising the risk that young children will be killed by carbon-monoxide poisoning or a bad case of pneumonia ravaging weakened lungs. Likewise, the women who typically ke

13、ep their home fires burning are vulnerable to chronic respiratory diseases. “Day in and day out for 50 years, some of these women might be cooking six hours a day, exposed to pollutions,” says Rehfuess.Curtailing indoor air pollution can be as simple as replacing open wood fires with better-ventilat

14、ed cookstoves, but more sophisticated stoves can cost up to $120. China and India, home to the worlds largest rural populations, have launched ambitious national programs in recent decades to supply villagers with safer stoves at subsidized prices. But the programs have not always worked, in India,

15、for example, some 33 million stoves were given out free to villagers in rural areas from 1984 to 2000but because of a lack of health education or follow-up maintenance, most families abandoned the cookstoves for their old fires within a few years.Thats left nongovernmental organizations like the she

16、ll Foundation to step into the gap. It has begun a pilot program with local Indian NGOs in a pair of rural states to develop and market clean, wood-burning stoves that cost just $5-$10 yet can reduce emissions by up to 40%. The project is on track to sell 1000,000 stoves by the end of 2005, and the

17、groups plan to expand the program nationally in the future. Program manager Karen Westley says Shell and its partner NGOs made an effort to sell their customers not just more efficient tools but also the idea that different is better. “You have to make sure people actually want that damn thing,” say

18、s Westely. “They need to make the connection between having a better stove, breathing less smoke and experiencing better health in the end.”But habits ingrained by tradition can be hard to break. “Theyve been living with this always, and so have their mothers and grandmothers,” says Rehfuess. “You h

19、ave to give people the felling they can do something about it.” And that theyll breathe a lot easier for their trouble.参考译文:说到空气污染，并不是说简单的日常生活就必然是最安全的。研究显示，在亚洲，毒气最浓的空气并不在新德里和北京这样的现代化速度很快的城市，而是在亚洲农村家庭的厨房里。在农村，上百万的家庭用明火取暖或是做饭，他们使用的是廉价的燃料，这些燃料所释放的一氧化碳量和其他有毒烟雾量是国际标准的500倍。农村地区的妇女和孩子经常每天在通风不好的厨房里待上几个小时，呼吸

20、这种有毒的空气。“这个问题从人类诞生以来就一直存在着，但是却一直被忽视了，”一位名叫伊娃.瑞弗丝的世界卫生组织室内空气污染方面的专家说道，“走进厨房你的眼睛就开始流泪，而且你会觉得呼吸困难，这太可怕了。”世界卫生组织估计，在发展中国家，室内空气污染造成每年160万人死亡，其中印度占55万而且死亡的大部分都是穷人。村民们除了用木头，煤或者是粪肥来烧火之外别无选择，这样会增加小孩子一氧化碳中毒死亡的危险，肺功能减弱，肺炎得病率增加。同样，那些在家里生火的妇女很容易得慢性呼吸道疾病。瑞弗丝说“有些妇女一天要花6小时做饭，五十年里日复一日，每天都生活在污染中。”减少室内空气污染其实非常简单，只要用一套

21、通风比较好的厨灶来代替木头生火就可以了，但是比较高级的厨灶要花120美元。中国和印度是世界上两个农村地区人口最多的国家，在最近几十年里启动了全国范围的救助项目，以补贴价格供给农村居民安全性能最好的厨灶。但是，这个项目并不是一直起作用。例如，印度政府在1984-2000年间免费发放了三百三十万套厨灶给农村地区农民，但是由于缺少健康知识教育和相关维护，多数家庭几年之后就又回到他们原来的取火方式了。这使得一些像谢尔基金会这样的非政府组织参与进来。该组织与印度当地非政府组织在一些乡村地区开始小规模实验项目，开发和推广干净的、燃烧木头的厨灶，并使之市场化。这样厨灶可以减少40%的氧化排放量，并且只需要5

22、-10美元。这个项目计划到2005年底出售15套厨灶，该组织准备今后在全国范围内推广这个项目。该项目的经理凯温.威斯特里说谢尔和它的非政府组织合作伙伴努力销售给顾客的不光是一种最高效的工具，而且还有一种理念，那就是：有所改变会更好。威斯特里说：“你必须要确定人们确实想要那东西与他们最终需要的联系，即在拥有一套好的厨灶，少呼吸烟雾和体验到健康的身体这三者之间建立一种联系。”但是根深蒂固的传统习惯很难改变。瑞弗丝说：“他们一直是这样生活的，包括他们的母亲和祖母也是这样生活的，你需要给他们一种感觉，那就是他们可以对此做些改变。”这样人们会对自己的麻烦事感到轻松许多。Unit 5 Weather an

23、d ClimateDialogues/monologues:I am passionate about English, and the challenge of expressing English fluently and swimmingly withforeigners was the principal motivation.1、having been brought up in the countryside.2、Those mighty winds pulled in a band of cloud and some patchy rain through the small h

24、ours, and into thefirst part of the morning.我的翻译是：那些强劲的大风卷起一层云彩，还有些零星的小雨下了好一会，一直持续到清晨。不知道准确否?请高手赐教。3、clearer skies and much light winds allowed temperatures to drop well into single figures resulting in a touchof grand frost in some rural areas.清凉的天空和微风让温度值降到了个位数,使得很多乡村地区出现了霜.4、The early sunshine gi

25、ving away to a bit more clouds.give away：让步。太阳被一小片云层遮住了。5、There was something of a drier interlude before an active weather system moved in from the west.6、Some of the more exposed locations saw sustained winds of 40mph with gusts of 58mph.Passage:The Greenhouse effect and Global warmingThe heart-tr

26、apping capacity of the atmosphere is popularly known as the “greenhouse effect”. Despite public controversy surrounding global warming, the natural greenhouse effect has been long established as fact in the scientific community.Indeed, carbon dioxide, and other gases, the earths natural climate woul

27、d be about 33 cooler than it is. Life would have evolved quite differently in such a climate.Most scientists believe that the rapid expansion of agriculture and industrial activities over the last several hundred years have generated significant increases in carbon dioxide and methane in the atmosph

28、ere. However, experts disagree about whether such changers have caused the increase of approximately 0.5 in the earths surface temperature that has been documented over the past century. Many scientists cite the fact that 1997 was the warmest year on record, following a decade in which 9 of the 11 h

29、ottest years of this century were reported, as strong, but circumstantial, evidence that human activities have altered the earths climate. Other experts, however, believe this temperature trend is a natural variation.Also disputed is whether projected world population growth to more than 10 billion

30、people by the year 2100 will result in a doubling or tripling of atmospheric concentrations of carbon dioxide. If such a buildup occurs, as many scientists predict, global surface temperatures could increase by anywhere from about one Celsius degree to about 4 Celsius degrees during the next century

31、. The higher half of range involves temperature changes outside of those experienced by human civilizations since the end of the last ice age some 10,000 years ago. During the last ice age, average global temperatures were only about 5 Celsius degrees cooler than the present period.A temperature inc

32、rease of several degrees Celsius could result in a sea level rise ranging from about 10 cm to about 1 m. A sea level rise of about 0.5 m would be noticeable primarily in the most vulnerable, low-lying islands and coastal areas. Larger sea level rises would result in extensive flooding of lowland bea

33、ches, wetlands, and coastal settlements. Moreover, a higher sea level base would increases the risk of catastrophic storm surges in coastal areas, since flooding would likely extend island well beyond historic levels.Warmer temperature could also intensify droughts in some regions, destabilize ecosystems, and cause the decline or extinction of some species. Since carbon dioxide enhances photosyn