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  3. Is there enough oil beneath the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge(保护区)(ANWR)to help secure America’s energy future? President Bush

Is there enough oil beneath the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge(保护区)(ANWR)to help secure America’s energy future? President Bush

admin2013-06-17  64
问题     Is there enough oil beneath the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge(保护区)(ANWR)to help secure America’s energy future? President Bush certainly thinks so. He has argued that tapping ANWR’s oil would help ease California’s electricity crisis and provide a major boost to the country’s energy independence. But no one knows for sure how much crude oil lies buried beneath the frozen earth, with the last government survey, conducted in 1998, projecting output anywhere from 3 billion to 16 billion barrels.
    The oil industry goes with the high end of the range, which could equal as much as 10% of U. S. consumption for as long as six years. By pumping more than 1 million barrels a day from the reserve for the next two to three decades, lobbyists claim, the nation could cut back on imports equivalent to all shipments to the U.S. from Saudi Arabia. Sounds good. An oil boom would also mean a multibillion-dollar windfall(意外之财)in tax revenues, royalties(开采权使用费)and leasing fees for Alaska and the Federal Government. Best of all, advocates of drilling say, damage to the environment would be insignificant. "We’ve never had a document case of oil rig chasing deer out onto the pack ice," says Alaska State Representative Scott Ogan.
    Not so fast, say environmentalists. Sticking to the low end of government estimates, the National Resources Defense Council says there may be no more than 3.2 billion barrels of economically recoverable oil in the coastal plain of ANWR, a drop in the bucket that would do virtually nothing to ease America’s energy problems.  And consumers would wait up to a decade to gain any benefits, because drilling could begin only after much bargaining over leases, environmental permits and regulatory review. As for ANWR’s impact on the California power crisis, environmentalists point out that oil is responsible for only 1% of the Golden State’s electricity output and just 3% of the nation’s.
What do the environmentalists mean by saying "Not so fast"( Line 1, Para. 3 )?
选项 A、Oil exploitation takes a long time.
B、The oil drilling should be delayed.
C、Don’t be too optimistic.
D、Don’t expect fast returns.
答案C
解析 综合推断。第三段开头的‘Not so fast’是一个过渡和转折。上面支持方说了开采ANWR地区石油的种种好处，现在作为反对方的环保主义者要给他们泼点冷水。首先这一地区的可开采量不会超过3.2 billion barrels，量太少；其次，要让消费者获益差不多要等十年，时间太长。因此支持方不要太乐观。选项 C)正确。
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