Green house
Intro:
How much do you know about global warming? This video will shed new light on your
knowledge about the subject.
New words and expressions:
disruption n.
unwanted break: an unwelcome or unexpected break in a process or activity
Jurassic n.
侏罗纪
paleoclimatologist n.
scientist that studies the prehistorical climate.
methane n.
沼气
1. When was the Jurassic Age?
A.175 billion years ago.
B.4.5 billion years ago.
C.175 million years ago.
Key: C
2. Jurassic Age was in _____.
A.Ice age period.
B.green house period
C.between ice age and green house period
Key: B
3. We are now in ______.
A.the last ice age period
B.the last green house period
C.between ice age and green house period
Key: A
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4. What can be inferred from the video?
A.There is more CO2 in the air in an Ice Age than in Green House period.
B. The Earth was all covered in ice in the last ice age period.
C. There is more CO2 in the air in the green house period than in an ice age.
Key: C
5. What is the biggest worry of Paleoclimatologists?
A.Human-induced emission of greenhouse gases will cause the all the ice to melt.
B.Human-induced emission of greenhouse gases will trigger the release of the vast reserves
of the gases locked up in seabeds.
C.They don't know how much warmer it has to take to turn the Earth back to the Jurassic
Age.
Key: B
Fill in the blanks with the better choice. Pay attention to how these words or phrases are
used in the way you are not familiar with. Listen to the video again and check your answer.
1.Scientists around the world are now working to replace the term global warming ______
global climate disruption.
A.for
B.with
Key: B
2. ... Steven Spielberg's Jurassic Park, in which science fiction gave us a ____________ of
what earth was like back in the Jurassic Age.
A.look
B. glimpse
Key: B
3. Paleoclimatologists tell us that the Earth has _____ between the Ice age periods and
greenhouse periods.
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A.changed
B.alternated
Key: B
4.Any significant portion came out, that ______ the human, current injection.
A.dwarfs
B.doofs
Key: A
5. they might artificially ________ Earth's climate back into another green house.
A.turn
B.trigger
Key: B
6. But they don't recommend __________.
A.taking the chance
B.trying
Key: A
Listen to the new and fill in the blanks with the words you hear:
1. Next we turn to the diary of our planet. Scientists around the world are now
working to replace the global warming with the term global climate
disruption
2. you can see that it's been composed of a number of ice ages with warmer periods
in between.
3. In fact, here is the beginning of civilizatin just when the last ice age warmed up for a bit, about
ten thousand years ago.
4. The big worry is that during an ice house period like the one we are in now, there are vast stores
of natural green house gases like CO2 and methane locked into the frigid mud under the seabed,
and frozen into the tons of soil around the north pole.
5. That's they worst fear. If human-induced green house emissions artificially
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warmed the planet enough to thaw out these vast reserves; and they get back in the air in a
run-away feedback making it even warmer, so even more thaws out, they might artificially trigger
Earth's climate back into another green house period.
6. Rapidly with much higher sea level since all the ice would melt, and
far too rapidly for human agriculture and civilization to adjust to.
7. Scientists don't know how exactly much warmer it has to get to melt out all those vast reserves
of natural green house gas, since human scientists weren't around the last it happened. But they
don't recommend taking the chance.
8. So that's part of the reason why so many leaders around the world now,
including the three American presidential candidates by the way, are fighting
for legislation to make sure that human drastically cut our green house emissions to try to make
sure that those Jurassic times stay up on the screen.
Please listen to the news again with the script.
Next we turn to the diary of our planet. Scientists around the world are now working to replace the
global warming with the term global climate disruption. So what is that mean? Here's Bill
Blakemore with his latest Nature's Edge
notebook.
One way to get a sense of one of the more extreme worries some scientists have about man-made
global warming, is to think about the difference between, say, New York's Central Park here, and
Steven Spielberg's Jurassic Park, in which science fiction gave us a glimpse of what earth was like
back in the Jurassic Age, a hundred and seventy five million years ago, during one of earth's green
house periods.
Let me explain with the help a few short cardboards and my filled tip here. Paleoclimatologists
who study the climate of Earth's deep past tell us that Earth formed about four billion and a half
years ago, has alternated between these hotter green house periods when there's little or no snow
or ice on the planet—here's the Jurassic Age over here with its dinosaurs, and these much colder
icehouse periods. And if you zoom in onto this current icehouse period, you can see that it's been
composed of a number of ice ages with warmer periods in between. In fact, here is the beginning
of civilization just when the last ice age warmed up for a bit, about ten thousand years ago. Human
only got started a few ice ages ago, over here.
The big worry is that during an ice house period like the one we are in now, there are vast stores of
natural green house gases like CO2 and methane locked into the frigid mud under the seabed, and
frozen into the tons of soil around the north pole. As Scientist Walter Oechel explained to us when
we visited northern Alaska right next to the Arctic ocean:
"Humans are putting about six or seven billion metric tons of carbon in the
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atmosphere a year, and we are standing on two hundred billion tons here."
"Any significant portion came out, that dwarfs the human, current injection
into the atmosphere. And once that run away and the release occur, there will
be no way to stop it."
That's they worst fear. If human-induced green house emissions artificially
warmed the planet enough to thaw out these vast reserves; and they get back in the air in a
run-away feedback making it even warmer, so even more thaws out, they might artificially trigger
Earth's climate back into another green house period. Rapidly with much higher sea level since all
the ice would melt, and far too rapidly for human agriculture and civilization to adjust to.
Scientists don't know how exactly much warmer it has to get to melt out all
those vast reserves of natural green house gas, since human scientists weren't around the last it
happened. But they don't recommend taking the chance.
So that's part of the reason why so many leaders around the world now,
including the three American presidential candidates by the way, are fighting
for legislation to make sure that human drastically cut our green house
emissions to try to make sure that those Jurassic times stay up on the screen.
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