85人教版高中英语第一册第十二课 POLLUTION

The pollution of the earth is increasing very fast. Man must make the earth support more people. This has made it necessary for agriculture and industry to develop very quickly.
With the development of modern agriculture and industry, more and more waste is produced. much of this waste is harmful. It goes into the water, the soil and the air. Some of it is absorbed and made harmless. But where there is too much of it, the poisonous waste may do great harm to the things around us. This is called pollution.
When farmers add fertilizer to the soil to make plants grow better, or spray poison to kill plant pests, poison is sent into the air, the water and the soil. When birds, fish and people eat the grain, drink the water or breathe the air, harm will be done to their health.
The air in big cities is often made very dirty by factories. Millions of tons of waste and poisonous gases are sent into the air with the smoke. In some places, little is done to make the smoke clean before it goes into the air.
Oil is burnt in cars, turcks and buses. They produce waste gases almost al harmful as the gases from factories. In big cities during cold winter month, many old people die from the polluted air. In places around big factories, trees and vegetables are often killed by the bad air.
Another kind of pullution is noise. Very loud noises can make people ill, hurt their ears, or even drive them mad. Houses near airports sometimes have their windows broken by the noise of jet planes passing overhead. Workers in some industries have their hearing harmed by the noise of the machines.
Every day, people throw away a lot of rubbish. Some of the rubbish, such as food, paper and iron, rots away over a long period of time. But plastics and rubber never rot. If they are burned, they give off poisonous gases. How to get rid of these things is a big problem.
Fortunately, people are beginning to realize just how serious the whole situation is. In many countries, laws have been passed to prevent factories from sending out poisonous gases and polluted water.
Many nutural meterials are becoming scarce. Scientists have found ways to take some useful things out of the waste meterials and use them again. This is called recycling. Steel, iron, glass, cloth and paper can all be recycled.
Waste water, too, can be recycled. When the waste water from factories is made clean and reused, a lot of money is saved. Waste water from a number of cities is “cleaned” before flowing back into rivers. Today, many rivers that were polluted are getting cleaner and cleaner. Fish and birds are returning to these rivers, and the water in them is no longer poisonous or dangerous to people’s health.
Man is fighting a battle against pollution. Yet, the battle will not be won until everyone knows how serious the danger is, and does something to stop it.