英語聽力文摘 “二手”空氣
Big cities, with all their pollution, have an effect on trees……
No doubt.
In the countryside.
Say what? Big cities affect the trees in the countryside?
You got it! According to a study conducted by Jillian Gregg, who now works at the EPA’s western-ecology division in Oregon, Eastern Cottonwood trees grew twice as big inside the Bronx as they did growing in small towns on Long Island.
But that just seems backwards. Cities are where all pollution, should that hamper the growth of the trees?
Cities are full of pollution, and it does have a detrimental effect on plant life–to say nothing of people life! But that doesn’t mean, unfortunately, that the converse is true –that once you get outside of the city, the environment is clean.
Regions can suffer from pollution that blows in from the cities and then lingers around the countryside. In particular, ozone does this.
Second-hand ozone?
Indeed, Gregg’s study, along with others, are fingering ozone as the factor that most significantly affects plant growth.
So Cities make the pollution but it blows over the countryside and hurts trees there instead. That seems so unfair.
It’s just another warning about the surprising effects of pollution–and how we all suffer from it, even when we think it’s someone else’s problem.
大都市的環(huán)境污染對樹有影響……
毫無疑。
……影響農(nóng)村的樹……
你說什么?大都市的環(huán)境污染對農(nóng)村的樹有影響?
沒錯!一項由Jillian Gregg發(fā)起的研究表明，在布朗克斯生長的美洲黑楊比小鎮(zhèn)紐約長島的高大兩倍，Jillian Greg在美國環(huán)保署西部生態(tài)分署的俄勒岡州工作。
我怎么覺得好像說反了，城市污染嚴重，就會影響到農(nóng)村樹木的生長嗎?
城市的環(huán)境污染確實有害植物生長，更不要說人的生活了。但是不幸的是，這并不能說明相反的是對的：遠離城市的環(huán)境就是無污染的。
城市的污染會從城市擴散到農(nóng)村，特別是污染農(nóng)村的新鮮空氣。
“二手”新鮮空氣?
事實上，Greg和其他人的研究都指出影響植物生長的就是空氣被污染了。
也就是說城市是污染的源頭，又擴散到農(nóng)村，還不利農(nóng)村樹木的生長，聽起來太不公平了。
這可能是另一個有關(guān)環(huán)境污染出人意料的影響：雖然我們認為環(huán)境污染不是自己的問題，但是我們都承受著其帶來的不良后果。
