Green Transport Week

Transportation is one aspect we cannot do without it this day. However, the current transportation systems come along with a wide range of problems including global warming, environmental worsening, health implications (physical, emotional, mental, spiritual), and emission (排放) of greenhouse gases. In fact, the transport sector takes up 23% of the globe’ s greenhouse gas emission resulting from burning of fossil fuels. Out of the total greenhouse gas emissions, road transport takes up a lion share, 75% to be exact and this trend is to increase in the future. All this puts lot of pressure on the national governments to work out policies to reduce greenhouse gas emissions as well as oil demands.

Figures show that over 90% of all road transportation relies on oil. This figure almost goes hand- in- hand with the total global oil consumption, which stands at 60%. All these have caught the eyes of most governments and policies are being made to change this worrying trend of air pollution.

For example, car use is at an all-time high in Britain, and as the roads get busier, green transport—by foot and bike— gets more and more difficult. The car is being used for increasingly short journeys, as a proportion of all car journeys, 24% are less than 2 miles and 58% are less than 5 miles. The car accounts for 81% of our journeys, walking for only 3% and cycling for 0.5%.

Therefore, the ETA set up the first Green Transport Week in order to raise awareness of the part transport has to play in the areas of personal safety, quality of life and health—as well as its broader global effect on our environment.

In the past we have used Green Transport Week as a celebration of sustainable (可持续性的) transport and as an opportunity to launch a number of national campaigns such as Walk to School Day and Pop-Up Zebra Crossing. Green Transport Week is the most effective way to get a debate going about transport issues in your area, and to spread awareness of the relationship between transport and the environment in schools and workplaces.

Have you got any electronic devices hanging around your home that you no longer want or use? Between us, we have millions of bits of unused tech kept in drawers. 【小题1】 There are several ways to make the most of our unwanted gadgets (小物件).

Probably the best cure for our throwaway culture is to fix our broken tech. 【小题2】 They can be learned at repair clubs and repair cafés — free meeting places where you'll find tools and materials to help you make any repairs you need. In the UK, the interest in mending our stuff and giving it a new life is reflected by the popularity of a TV series called The Repair Shop, where craftspeople rescue and resurrect (重新使用) items that their owners thought were beyond saving.

【小题3】 Materials used to make them can be extracted and reused in other things. As an example, Elisabeth Ratcliffe from the Royal Society of Chemistry told the BBC: “There are about thirty different elements just in a smartphone, and many of them are very rare.” These can be used in touch screens and solar panels. Many of the biggest players in the industry (including Apple and Samsung) will gladly take your old gadgets back and handle them responsibly. 【小题4】

A final choice for your unwanted items is to up-cycle them. You can breathe new life into them by transforming them into valuable pieces or collectable retroitems (复古物品), which could be sold on. 【小题5】 By up-cycling, you contribute to waste reduction and innovation in product reuse.

My dad works with green technology. Last summer, he was sent to a small town called Gaviotas in Colombia. He decided to take me with him. At first I wasn’t too keen. What was I going to do in the middle of nowhere, in a country where I couldn’t even speak the language? And anyway, what was so special about Gaviotas?

My dad told me that Gaviotas was an example of how people could live without destroying the environment. This got me a bit more interested, so I did some research. I found out that Gaviotas was founded in 1971 by a group of scientists and artists. They had decided to build a completely new town in the remote, war-worn eastern Colombia where there was nothing.

When we eventually arrived, I was amazed by how green it was and my dad explained that they had replanted millions of trees. There were many different species of birds flying about and flowers everywhere. I was beginning to like it. My dad’s contact in Gaviotas has a son exactly my age Ricardo. He speaks really good English and so for the next week he was my guide to this amazing place. The first thing he pointed out to me was all the fantastic technology that had been invented there. Ricardo told me that they produce 70% of all their own energy and food with very little waste. The trees they planted more than compensate for any greenhouse gases they emit（排放）.

But Gaviotas is not a success just because of its green technology, it’s also a model for how people can live more peacefully together. Every family gets a free home, free meals and free schooling for the children. So there is no poverty. People get on well with each other. It’ s fantastic.

I was really sad to leave Gaviotas, but now I have a new dream: I hope that 20 years from now, we’ll all be living in towns like Gaviotas.