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1、本文格式为Word版，下载可编辑2022考研英语阅读北极气候变化 Climate change in the Arctic 北极气候变化 Beating a retreat 仓惶撤退 Arctic sea ice is melting far faster than climatemodels predict. Why? 北极海冰正在以比气候模型所猜测的快得多的速度溶化，为什么? ON SEPTEMBER 9th, at the height of its summertime shrinkage, ice covered 4.33m squarekm, or 1.67m square mil
2、es, of the Arctic Ocean, according to America s National Snow andIce Data Centre. 据美国国家冰雪中心监测，今年的9月9日，处于夏季收缩极值的北极海冰仅仅掩盖了433万平方公里，或相当于167万平方英里的北冰洋洋面。 That is not a record lownot quite. 这虽未创下最低记录，但也已相去不远。 But the actual record, 4.17m squarekm in 20xx, was the product of an unusual combination of sunny
3、 days, cloudless skies andwarm currents flowing up from mid-latitudes. 20xx年的417万平方公里的最低记录是受到当时艳阳高照，万里无云的天空以及从中纬度上来的暖流这种特别组合的影响的产物。 This year has seen no such opposite of a perfect storm, yet the summer sea-ice minimum is amere 4% bigger than that record. 而尽管并没有观测到如此不利的状况，今年海冰的微小值也仅仅比那年的记录大了4%。 Add
4、in the fact that the thickness of the ice, which is much harder to measure, is estimatedto have fallen by half since 1979, when satellite records began, and there is probably less icefloating on the Arctic Ocean now than at any time since a particularly warm period 8,000years ago, soon after the las
5、t ice age. 除此以外，较难测量的冰面厚度估计比首次有卫星观测记录的1979年降低了一半。现在，漂移在北冰洋上面的冰块很可能是8000千年前最终一个冰河期结束后的那个极暖期以来最少的。 That Arctic sea ice is disappearing has been known for decades. 数十年前，人们已经熟悉到北极海冰正在消亡一事。 The underlying cause is believed by all but a handful of climatologists to be global warmingbrought about by greenh
6、ouse-gas emissions. 除了少数人以外，几乎全部气候学家都将其归咎于温室气体排放所带来的全球变暖。 Yet the rate the ice is vanishing confounds these climatologists models. 然而海冰消逝的速率使这些气象学家建立的气候模型陷入混乱。 These predict that if the level of carbon dioxide, methane and so on in the atmospherecontinues to rise, then the Arctic Ocean will be free
7、of floating summer ice by the end of thecentury. Climate change in the Arctic 北极气候变化 Beating a retreat 仓惶撤退 Arctic sea ice is melting far faster than climatemodels predict. Why? 北极海冰正在以比气候模型所猜测的快得多的速度溶化，为什么? ON SEPTEMBER 9th, at the height of its summertime shrinkage, ice covered 4.33m squarekm, or
8、1.67m square miles, of the Arctic Ocean, according to America s National Snow andIce Data Centre. 据美国国家冰雪中心监测，今年的9月9日，处于夏季收缩极值的北极海冰仅仅掩盖了433万平方公里，或相当于167万平方英里的北冰洋洋面。 That is not a record lownot quite. 这虽未创下最低记录，但也已相去不远。 But the actual record, 4.17m squarekm in 20xx, was the product of an unusual comb
9、ination of sunny days, cloudless skies andwarm currents flowing up from mid-latitudes. 20xx年的417万平方公里的最低记录是受到当时艳阳高照，万里无云的天空以及从中纬度上来的暖流这种特别组合的影响的产物。 This year has seen no such opposite of a perfect storm, yet the summer sea-ice minimum is amere 4% bigger than that record. 而尽管并没有观测到如此不利的状况，今年海冰的微小值也仅仅
10、比那年的记录大了4%。 根据他们的估计，若大气中的二氧化碳、甲烷以及其他温室气体持续增加，到本世纪末夏季的北极海冰将完全消逝。 At current rates of shrinkage, by contrast, this looks likely to happen some time between20xx and 2050. 但是相较之下，依现在的消融速率，这一状况将可能在20xx年到2050年之间发生。 The reason is that Arctic air is warming twice as fast as the atmosphere as a whole. 其缘由是由于
11、北极的空气正在以大气整体的两倍速度暖化。 Some of the causes of this are understood, but some are not. 其中部分根源已经被了解，但仍有一些未能解开。 The darkness of land and water compared with the reflectiveness of snow and ice means thatwhen the latter melt to reveal the former, the area exposed absorbs more heat from thesun and reflects less of it back into space. 与强反射的冰雪表面相比，当其溶化后露出下面深色的陆地或水体时，这部分区域将从太阳汲取到更多的热量而仅仅反射更少的部分到空中。 The result is a feedback loop that accelerates local warming. Such feedback, though, does notcompletely explain what is happening. 结果造成了一个局部暖化加速的恶性循环，尽管这种反馈机制未能完全解释当下正在发生的事情。 6 / 6
