New diamonds “made from the sky”奇特鉆石，“天空制造”

王影

我們知道鉆石形成于地殼深部70公里以下，由碳原子瞬間結(jié)晶而成。但是，今天我們這篇文章中的鉆石來自天空。這是怎么回事呢？讓我們一起來看看吧！

難詞探意

1. gem /d?em/ n. 寶石;美妙絕倫的事物

2. suck /s?k/ v. 吸取

3. boundary /?ba?ndri/ n. 界限;邊界

4. paradigm /?p?r?da?m/ n. 范例;樣式

5. geoengineering /?d?i??end???n??r?/ n. 地質(zhì)工程學(xué)

6. sustainable /s??ste?n?bl/ adj. 可持續(xù)的;不破壞生態(tài)平衡的

Here are real gems of gifts—eco?friendly diamonds “made entirely from the sky”. Sky Diamonds are created by sucking carbon out of the atmosphere which gets turned into eye?catching stones. And theyre proving a huge hit with shoppers looking for green gifts because they have zero impact on the planet—unlike the mining of traditional diamonds. It is the idea of clean energy entrepreneur Dale Vince OBE， who founded the worlds first green energy company， Ecotricity， back in 1996.

Discussing the topic in his new book， Manifesto， Dale explains how the incredible process took several years to perfect. He writes， “Sometimes pushing the boundaries is not enough. We need a new paradigm. Henry Ford said， before he made cars—if hed asked his customers what they wanted， they would have said ‘faster horses.”

“To create the Green Industrial Revolution we need to do old things in new ways—and in some cases just let go of what we know. Living a green lifestyle isnt about giving things up but about doing them differently， whether were talking burgers， cars or football—and now diamonds.”

“Some years ago， I was thinking about the concept of geoengineering—how to get carbon from the atmosphere. That led me to think about how to store that carbon， and to the simple thought that the most permanent form of carbon—the toughest of all—is a diamond.”

“I wondered if it might be possible to take carbon out of the atmosphere and turn it into diamonds. I loved the idea. So we pursued it. It took few years but weve done it. Were making diamonds from atmospheric carbon. Diamonds exactly come from the sky.”

“People have looked at me like I was crazy or they misheard me， when I told them what I was working on. And fair enough， as an idea， its out there—outside the paradigm， like green energy back in the day. But here we are， we no longer need to mine the earth for diamonds; we can mine the sky. Green technology should be exactly like this—sustainable， moral and fun. The life we need to live is just like that.”

Reading?Check

1. How are sky diamonds made？

A. By underground mining.

B. By taking carbon out of metal.

C. By sucking carbon from water.

D. By getting carbon from the atmosphere.

2. Who thought of the idea of sky diamonds？

A. Dale. B. Henry Ford.

C. Ecotricity. D. Jewelry fans.

3. According to Dale， living a green lifestyle means _______.

A. giving up things B. forgetting old things

C. doing things in new ways D. using a small amount of energy

4. What is the authors attitude towards sky diamonds？

A. Positive. B. Indifferent.

C. Objective. D. Disapproving.

Language?Study

Sentence for writing

I wondered if it might be possible to take carbon out of the atmosphere and turn it into diamonds. 我想知道是否有可能將碳從大氣中提取出來并轉(zhuǎn)化為鉆石。

【信息提取】此句中wondered后面接了由if 引導(dǎo)的賓語從句。當(dāng)wonder意為“想知道”時(shí)，后面經(jīng)常接由if、whether、what、where、when、who等引導(dǎo)的賓語從句。

【句式仿寫】我想知道他是否會(huì)來。