Question

    If plastic had been invented when the Pilgrims (清教徒移民) sailed from Plymouth, England, to North America and the Mayflower had been stocked with bottled water and plastic-wrapped snacks, their plastic waste would likely still be around, four centuries later. If the Pilgrims had been like many people today and had simply thrown their empty bottles and wrappers over the side, Atlantic waves and sunlight would have worn all that plastic into tiny bits. And those bits might still be floating around the world’s oceans today, waiting to be eaten by unfortunate fish, and eventually perhaps by one of us.

Because plastic wasn’t invented until the late 19th century, and production really only took off around 1950, we have a mere 9.2 billion tons of the stuff to deal with. Of that, more than 6.9 billion tons have become waste. And of that waste, a shocking 6.3 billion tons never made it to recycling facilities.

No one knows how much unrecycled plastic waste ends up in the ocean, Earth’s last sink. In 2015, Jenna Jambeck, a university of Georgia engineering professor, caught everyone’s attention with a rough estimate: between 5.3 million and 14 million tons each year just from coastal regions. Most of it isn’t thrown off ships, she and her colleagues say, but is dumped carelessly on land or in rivers, mostly in Asia. It’s then blown or washed into the sea. It’s unclear how long it will take for that plastic to completely biodegrade (降解). Estimates range from 450 years to never.

Meanwhile, ocean plastic is estimated to kill millions of marine animals every year. Nearly 700 species, including endangered ones, are known to have been affected by it. Some are harmed visibly-strangled (勒死) by abandoned fishing nets. Many more are probably harmed invisibly. Marine species of all sizes, from fish to whale, now eat microplastics, the bits smaller than one-fifth of an inch across. On Hawaii’s Big Island, on a beach to which no paved road, I walked ankle-deep through mocroplastics. After that, I could understand why some people see ocean plastic as an approaching disaster, worth mentioning in the same breath as climate change.

And yet there’s a key difference: Ocean plastic is not as complicated as climate change. There are no mean waste deniers (否认者), at least so far. To do something about it, we have to remake our planet’s entire energy system.

“This isn’t a problem where we don’t know what the solution is,” says Jambeck. “We know how to pick up garbage. Anyone can do it. We know how to deal with it. We know how to recycle.” It’s a matter of building the necessary institutions and systems, she says--ideally before the ocean tums, for centuries to come, into a thin soup of plastic.

1.In the first paragraph the author emphasizes the fact that ______.

A.British people migrated to America four centuries ago

B.people have kept doing research in plastic for four centuries

C.there was no plastic pollution four centuries ago

D.plastic waste would remain in the ocean for four centuries

2.How are marine animals harmed invisibly by ocean plastic?

A.They eat microplastics.

B.They drown in microplastics.

C.They are coated with waste plastic bags.

D.They are struggling in abandoned plastic nets.

3.Which of the following statements is TRUE according to the passage?

A.People all agree reducing plastic production is the solution.

B.People tend to agree plastic waste has caused ocean plastic.

C.It has been scheduled to reverse the trend of climate change.

D.It has been scheduled to reverse the trend of ocean plastic.

Answer

1.D

2.A

3.B

【解析】

这是一篇说明文。主要介绍了塑料的危害性，以及给海洋和海洋动物带来的伤害，并在最后暗示呼吁人们积极应对解决塑料垃圾和海洋塑料问题。

1.细节理解题。根据第一段中If plastic had been invented when the Pilgrims (清教徒移民) sailed from Plymouth, England, to North America and the Mayflower had been stocked with bottled water and plastic-wrapped snacks, their plastic waste would likely still be around, four centuries later. 可知如果塑料是在清教徒从英国普利茅斯航行到北美的时候发明的，而且“五月花”号上还备有瓶装水和塑料包装的零食，那么四个世纪后，他们的塑料垃圾可能还会存在。由此可知，在第一段中，作者强调了这样一个事实：塑料垃圾会在海洋中存留四个世纪。故选D。

2.推理判断题。根据第四段中Many more are probably harmed invisibly. Marine species of all sizes, from fish to whale, now eat microplastics, the bits smaller than one-fifth of an inch across.可知更多的动物可能受到无形的伤害。各种大小的海洋生物，从鱼类到鲸鱼，现在都以直径小于五分之一英寸的塑料微粒为食。由此可知，海洋动物的吃塑料微粒，从而海洋塑料在不知不觉中伤害了海洋动物。故选A。

3.细节理解题。根据第三段中In 2015, Jenna Jambeck, a university of Georgia engineering professor, caught everyone’s attention with a rough estimate: between 5.3 million and 14 million tons each year just from coastal regions. Most of it isn’t thrown off ships, she and her colleagues say, but is dumped carelessly on land or in rivers, mostly in Asia. It’s then blown or washed into the sea.可知2015年，乔治亚大学(university of Georgia)工程学教授Jenna Jambeck用一个粗略的估计引起了所有人的注意：光是沿海地区每年就有530万到1400万吨。她和她的同事们说，大部分垃圾不是从船上丢弃的，而是被随意地扔在陆地上或河里，主要是在亚洲，然后被吹到海里。由此可知，人们倾向于认为塑料垃圾造成了海洋塑料。故选B。