Question

    If you are worried about the planet, please make sure your rubbish is buried under the ground.

People talk about “reduce, reuse, recycle.” It sounds like a good idea. There is a problem, though. Recycling costs too much money.

Even the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) says it only makes sense economically and environmentally to recycle about 35 percent of disabled (废弃的) materials. Among those materials are paper and aluminum(铝) cans. Recycling 1 ton of paper or aluminum cans, the agency says, can save about 3 tons of CO₂ emissions (排放物) over producing those materials anew. Paper producers pay for the trees they process. If it was cost-effective to recycle paper, producers would be beating down your door to buy it. But they aren’t. That means it’s more expensive to recycle old paper than to cut trees and then replant trees for processing.

Plastic can be recycled too. Given the recent drop in crude oil (原油) prices, it is now cheaper to make a new plastic container than to recycle an old one. Even if that were not true, the EPA says that recycling a ton of plastic saves only about a ton of CO₂. However, it doesn’t take into account the water most consumers use to wash their plastic containers before having them recycled. The New York Times journalist John Tierney recently wrote, “If you wash plastic in water that was heated by electricity, then the effort of your recycling could be more carbon in the atmosphere.”

Glass is another recyclable material. To reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 1 ton you have to recycle 3 tons of glass. If one includes the cost of collecting glass waste from neighborhoods, and the pollution produced by the collection trucks and the recycling process itself, glass recycling creates more greenhouse gas emissions and is more expensive than making new glass, which comes primarily from sand that exists everywhere.

If recycling were truly cost-effective, private companies would be lining up at your doorstep to buy your rubbish. Don’t look now because they’re not there.

1.What’s the EPA’s attitude to recycling aluminum cans?

A.It is helpful to the environment.

B.It is actually a waste of money.

C.It costs less than recycling paper.

D.It costs the same as producing new cans.

2.What increases the cost of recycling plastic?

A.The crude oil.

B.The water pollution

C.The process to clean it.

D.The electricity for lights.

3.What can be learned about making new glass?

A.It results in lots of waste in neighborhood.

B.The material for new glass can be easily got.

C.It is slightly more expensive than recycling glass.

D.Making 3 tons of new glass produces 1 ton of carbon emissions.

4.What does the author mean by saying the underlined sentence?

A.Recycling will disappear soon.

B.Companies will line up at your doorstep.

C.Recycling is a way to deal with your rubbish.

D.Companies won’t bother to collect discarded materials.

Answer

1.A

2.C

3.B

4.D

【解析】

这是一篇议论文。作者就垃圾的回收利用提出了自己的观点：听起来很美，但由于回收费用高昂，所以不值得。

1.推理判断题。根据第三段中Recycling 1 ton of paper or aluminum cans, the agency says, can save about 3 tons of CO2 emissions (排放物) over producing those materials anew.可知，EPA认为与制造新的铝罐相比，回收利用铝罐可以节省二氧化碳的排放量。所以，EPA对回收铝罐的态度是它对环境有帮助，故选A。

2.细节理解题。根据第四段中However, it doesn’t take into account the water most consumers use to wash their plastic containers before having them recycled.可知，作者认为EPA没有把在对塑料再利用前清洗塑料使用的水的消耗考虑在内，所以是对使用过的塑料产品进行清洗的过程增加了回收利用塑料的成本，故选C。

3.细节理解题。根据第五段中glass recycling creates more greenhouse gas emissions and is more expensive than making new glass, which comes primarily from sand that exists everywhere.可知，生产玻璃的原料到处都是，所以很容易获得，故选B。

4.句意猜测题。根据最后一段If recycling were truly cost-effective, private companies would be lining up at your doorstep to buy your rubbish. Don’t look now because they’re not there.可知，作者认为如果回收物品真的可以节约成本，私人企业一定会在你的门口大排长龙，争相购买你的垃圾。别四处看了，因为他们没在门口。所以作者是用了戏谑的方式再次强调了自己的观点：回收利用旧物的成本太高，私企们不愿意去做这样的事。故选D。