If we planted a lot more trees in just the right places, they could reduce the amount of carbon in the atmosphere to levels not seen since the 1920s, said study leader Jean Francois Bastin, an ecologist from the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology. After examining more than 70,000 high-quality satellite photos of trees from all over the planet, ecologists concluded that the earth could support 900 million additional hectares (公顷) of tree cover.
Bastin and his colleagues developed a computer program that estimates how much forested land could be restored both now and in a future warmer world. The team members combed through 78,774 satellite photos of a variety of ecosystems- everywhere from the thick Amazon rainforest to the dry Sahel in Africa-that had been protected from human influence. They counted every tree in every photo to assess the current tree coverage in natural environments. The researchers combined that information with data about the climate, temperature and soil conditions for each ecosystem. Then they taught their program to put it all together to determine how much tree coverage a particular area could support.
The result shows trees currently cover 2.8 billion hectares of land- but they have the potential to populate as much as 4.4 billion hectares. Right now, much of the additional 1.6 billion hectares is being used for agriculture or urban spaces. The researchers took those areas off the table and saw that the earth still has 900 million hectares ready and waiting to be restored with trees an area roughly the size of Brazil. When those trees mature, they could remove 205 gigatonnes (兆吨) of carbon from the atmosphere, the study calculated, That represents about two-thirds of the roughly 300 gigatonnes of atmospheric carbon that can be traced to human actions, they said.
Even if trees are planted in the most mindful way, other actions are still needed to fight climate change, Bastin said.
【小题1】Why did Bastin develop a computer program?A.To reduce air pollution in Africa. |
B.To determine carbon dioxide in the air. |
C.To assess the potential forested land. |
D.To calculate the area of forest in the world. |
A.Looked into. | B.Put away. |
C.Brought back. | D.Took in. |
A.Brazil has large areas to plant trees. |
B.The tree cover is not enough to control greenhouse gases. |
C.Trees removed two-thirds of carbon in the atmosphere. |
D.Other actions are equally important compared to planting trees. |
A.Disapproving. | B.Doubtful. |
C.Supportive. | D.Objective. |
If humans pump enough carbon dioxide (CO2) into the atmosphere, the stratocumulus clouds(层积云 ) could disappear, and the earth's temperature could climb sharply to heights not predicted in current climate models. It would burn the planet. That's the conclusion of a paper published in the journal Nature Geoscience and described in detail by Natalie Wolchover for Quanta Magazine.
As Wolchover explained, clouds have long been one of the great uncertainties of climate models. Computer models that easily capture the complexity and detail of most climate systems just aren't powerful enough to predict worldwide changes in cloud behavior. But clouds are important. They reflect sunlight away from the earth's surface. And stratocumulus clouds are those white blankets you might have seen as you looked out the window of arm airplane, rolling out below you and hiding the ground Researchers suspect that certain sudden, past jumps in temperature may have been caused by changes to clouds like these.
For the new research, scientists modeled just a small patch of sky using a supercomputer. They found that if carbon dioxide levels reach about 1, 200 parts per million(ppm) in the atmosphere, stratocumulus clouds break up. That's a very high carbon dioxide concentration. Right now, levels have climbed past 410 ppm--a dangerous change from 280 ppm before the Industrial Revolution.
But humans put more and more CO2 into the atmosphere every year. If current trends continue, the earth could reach 1, 200 ppm within 100 to 150 years. This could happen if our society doesn't follow through on any of its commitments to reduce emissions(排放), Wolchover reported. And even if it does, the result would be another 8 degrees Celsius of heat added to the global average, on top of the dangerous changes already underway due to greenhouse gases.
That’s an enormous change, and it goes beyond predictions of worldwide ice melt and catastrophic sea level rise. And, once the stratocumulus clouds are gone, Wolchover reported, they likely wouldn't reappear until atmospheric carbon dioxide levels dropped below where they are currently.
There's still some uncertainty in the data. The 1, 200 ppm figure could change as scientists look into the issue further.
【小题1】What can we learn from paragraph 2?A.Most climate systems are not complex. |
B.Cloud behavior is uncertain and hard to predict. |
C.Temperature changes affect the stratocumulus clouds. |
D.The stratocumulus clouds protect planes from sunlight. |
A.By measuring the sea level. |
B.By experimenting in a natural state. |
C.By comparing climate models. |
D.By computer modeling and analyzing. |
A.The atmosphere. |
B.The earth. |
C.Our society. |
D.The result. |
A.The effects of CO2 emissions have been fully assessed. |
B.The stratocumulus clouds won't return if they are gone. |
C.The breakup of stratocumulus clouds could result in catastrophes. |
D.Once CO2 level reaches 1, 200 ppm, stratocumulus clouds will go extinct. |
The Effects of a Warmer World Are Visible in Animals’ Bodies
For humans, adapting to climate change will mostly be a matter of technology. More air conditioning, better-designed houses and bigger flood defences may help mitigate the effects of a warm world.
Ryding, a phd candidate at Deakin University, in Australia, shows that is already happening. Climate change is already altering the bodies of many animal species, giving them bigger beaks, limbs and ears. In some species of Australian parrot, for instance, beak size has increased by between 4 % and 10 % since 1871.
All that dovetails (吻合)nicely with evolutionary theory. “Allen’s rule”, named for Joel Asaph Allen, who suggested it in 1877, holds that warm-blooded-animals in hot places tend to have larger appendages (附属物) than those in less hot regions.
Ms Ryding examined museum specimens, comparing their bodies to those of their modern counterparts. She is not the first researcher to take that approach.
Studying a broader range of animals will help firm up exactly what is happening. Much of Ms Ryding’s data concern birds, with less information available for other taxa (类群). But it seems clear that the world of the future is not just going to be hotter than humans are used to.
A.And there are other ways to adapt, too. |
B.The animals living in it will look different, too. |
C.Larger wings are heavier, and bigger legs cost more energy to grow. |
D.Animals will have to rely on changing their bodies or their behaviour. |
E.But it is hard to prove that climate change was the cause of an anatomical (结构上的) change. |
F.Since any evolutionary adaptation comes with trade-offs, it is unclear how far the process might go. |
G.Such adaptations boost an animal's surface area relative to its body volume, helping it to shed excess heat. |
Population and climate
The human population on Earth has grown to the point that it is having an effect on Earth’s atmosphere and ecosystems. Burning of fossil fuels, deforestation, urbanization, and cultivation of rice and cattle are increasing the concentration of carbon dioxide, nitrogen oxides and dust in the atmosphere. About 70 percent of the Sun’s energy passes through the atmosphere and strikes Earth’s surface. This radiation heats the surface of the land and ocean, and these surfaces then reradiate infrared radiation back into space. This allows Earth to avoid heating up too much. However, not all of the infrared radiation makes it into space; some is absorbed by gases in the atmosphere and is reradiated back to Earth’s surface. A greenhouse gas is one that absorbs infrared radiation and then reradiates some of this radiation back to Earth. Carbon dioxide and nitrogen oxides are greenhouse gases. In fact, without greenhouse gases in the atmosphere, scientists calculate that Earth would be about 33℃ cooler than it currently is.
The current concentration of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere is about 360 parts per million. Human activities are having a major influence on atmospheric carbon dioxide concentrations, which are rising so fast that current predictions made by scientists are that atmospheric concentrations of carbon dioxide will double in the next 50 to 100 years.
Some scientists predict that a doubling of carbon dioxide concentration will raise global temperatures anywhere between 1.4℃ and 4.5℃. The increase in temperature will not be uniform, with the smallest changes at the equator and changes two or three times as great at the poles. The local effects of these global changes are difficult to predict, but it is generally agreed that they may include alterations in ocean currents, increased winter flooding in some areas of the Northern Hemisphere, a higher incidence of summer drought in some areas, and rising sea levels, which may flood low-lying countries.
【小题1】It can be inferred from the passage that one positive aspect of greenhouse gases is that they _______.A.remove pollutants from Earth’s atmosphere and ecosystems |
B.absorb 70 percent of the Sun’s energy |
C.help keep Earth warm |
D.double atmospheric concentrations of carbon dioxide |
A.The rapid rise of atmospheric carbon dioxide concentrations is mostly caused by human activities. |
B.Human activities will no longer have an influence on atmospheric carbon dioxide concentrations in the next 50 to 100 years. |
C.Some scientists predict that atmospheric carbon dioxide concentrations will not increase in the next 50 to 100 years. |
D.Some scientists recently predict that atmospheric carbon dioxide concentrations that are largely influenced by human activities will double in the next 50 to 100 years. |
A.different |
B.identical |
C.comparable |
D.changeable |
A.Sea levels will fall. |
B.The effects will not occur in some regions of the world. |
C.The local plants and forests will be permanently damaged. |
D.It is hard to know exactly what form the local effects will take. |
A.Raising livestock and growing rice are the actions of humans. |
B.The surface of the land and ocean can help decrease the temperature of Earth. |
C.Although carbon dioxide concentration may double in the future, temperatures at the North Pole and South Pole may not change. |
D.Nitrogen oxides absorb infrared radiation that can increase the temperature of Earth. |
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