Ecology and ecosystem
As the first engines were created, people’s lives were changed dramatically. Certainly, everyone was amazed at the pluses of technological development: it saved a lot of time and simplified daily routine. People were hypnotized by the opportunities new technological advances can give them. More and more goods were produced each year. But, as we know, nothing could be created from nothing — various kinds of fuels and raw materials have to be used. And only in some decades, when it became hard to breathe in big cities and when acid rains started to destroy forests, man asked himself: am I to blame?
Actually, yes. Man was used to taking everything from the Earth. Dazzled by its rich¬es, he destroyed the fragile ecological balance. Let’s take, for example, CO, emissions. Before thousands of factories were built, forests had been able to cope with carbon diox¬ide. They even needed this carbon dioxide — the constant processes of photosynthesis and breathing are the key to life. But then we started to burn fuel and the level of CO, in the atmosphere rose drastically. And why are people so afraid of it? Well, firstly, we can notice there are less shiny days — the atmosphere is foggy, the Earth is getting less solar energy (don’t forget that the Sun is integral to life). Secondly, it can happen that we simply won’t be able to breathe — fortunately, it’s unlikely to happen right now, people still have time to change this dangerous situation. But what we can observe nowadays is so-called «the greenhouse effect».
The ozone layer prevents carbon dioxide from going back to space and, consequently, our Earth is warming up. At first sight there is nothing wrong with it — there are even some advantages of global warming: it’s good for agriculture, for example. But all of us have heard about ice starting to melt. It means that lots of small islands will disappear under water, as well as some kind of fish will be unable to live in sweet water. And all this can lead to further consequences: the extinction of penguins and polar bears, weird weather conditions, outbreaks of malaria, etc.
Anyway, CO2, is not the most dangerous substance in the world. Just think about some chemicals which cannot be recycled by the Earth or it takes hundreds of years to do it. We live in the era of high-tech pollution. When we throw away old TV-sets, radios, computers, they just lie in piles somewhere not far from cities. They cannot dissolve, evaporate or rot. If to start to destroy them, for instance, to incinerate them, it could cause even more problems: very often these substances are poisonous. It seems to be a situation without way-out! We can’t stop producing technological devices, but when they are obsolete, we don’t know how to destroy them. Some governments are trying to find solutions to this situation, e.g, not to sell some devices but just to lease them, but it’s obvious many people won’t be satisfied with this decision. I think the best solution will be to find a way to recycle these chemicals. Probably it’s impossible nowadays, but chemistry is developing, in some years it could be real. Earlier we couldn’t even imagine that it would be possible to reuse paper and glass, nowadays it’s great help.
Задание 1. Прочитать, перевести устно.
Задание 2. Выписать 15 неизвестных слов с переводом. Составить свои примеры с новой лексикой. (15 примеров)
Задание 3. Составить 10 во к тексту