Text 3.3 Environmental Protection

1. We live in the 21-st century, the century of the scientific and technological progress, atomic power station, computerized management, mechanization, spaceships, pipelines, new roads, automated lines and highways.

2. But the price for a rapid industrial development is too high: natural resources are exhausted, the ecological balance of the planet is disturbed; some

species of flora and fauna have disappeared; city and industry waters, chemicals and fertilizes are endangering lakes, rivers and pounds.

3. Thus humanity faces the problem of ecological catastrophe.

4. Now I'd like to go into details.

5. The main ecological problems are: polluted air and water (especially in big cities), garbage and solid wastes, acid rains and problem of global warming.

6. As for polluted air and water, there are two sad examples in the history of mankind.

7. We know about the «killer smog» caused over 4000 deaths in London in December 1952 and the dangerous alarm that came from Japan in 1966 when sixty people died because they had eaten polluted fish.

8. We must stop dumping wastes into the lakes and rivers.

9. Harmful wastes may also get into the soil or drain off fields that have been sprayed with pesticides. Pesticides are often used to kill insects and weeds in cities or on farms. Polluted water can spread many diseases.

10. Sometimes the trash is burned, causing air pollution too. By the way, the problem of solid wastes and garbage is also very important.

11. Every day people throw away a lot of garbage and trash.

12. And a more healthy way to get rid of them is to spread them over the land and press them down.

13. After that we put down the ground and grass can be planted again.

14. The next problem is acid rains. It's a kind of air pollution which' is caused by factories, plants and car-exhaust gases. They send smoke into the air and the wind carries it far from the factories.

15. Then all these chemicals come down with the rain. So we call these rains acid.

16. It's like vinegar or lemon juice and it hurts when it gets into your eyes.

17. Nowadays scientists try to find out all the effects of acid rains on the animals and nature.

18. I can't but mention the problem of global warming.

19. The climate on our planet has changed much, the temperature is rising nowadays. If the temperature grows by 5-6 degrees, it will be impossible to live on the planet. In this case the humanity faces the threat of the world flooding.

20. In recent years the environmental protection problem has received great publicity.

21. In many countries the agencies are set up. Such organization as «Green Peace» and «Friends of the Earth» try to put pressure upon those governments, which don't care about ecology in countries.

22. Numerous anti-pollution acts pass all over the world. As for scientists, they are divided into two groups.

23. The pessimistic scientists suppose that we have already reached the point «no return» in this matter.

24. The optimists believe that our ecological problems solvable because more and more people begin to understand how dangerous they are.

25. Mankind will be able to survive only if we all understand that environmental protection is our universal concern.

26. We must realize that either we stop killing the Earth or we kill ourselves.

to exhaust истощать

to disturb нарушать

natural resources полезные ископаемые

pollution загрязнение

environment окружающая среда

atomic power station атомная электростанция

scientific научный

wastes отходы

species of flora and fauna разновидности флоры и фауны

fertilizers удобрение

car-exhaust gases выхлопные газы

то get rid of избавляться

acid rains кислотные дожди

vinegar уксус

to hurt причинять боль

to survive выживать

mankind, humanity человечество