IELTS Reading Academic Practice
Here an opportunity to
improve your IELTS Reading IELTS test is all about practice. While practicing things to keep in mind are how fast you can read and how you can improve you vocabulary. You should be familiar with the Academic Word List, and be able to understand all the words. I found this useful site with lots of exercises I'll include it here so you can check it for yourself
http://www.englishvocabularyexercises.com/AWL/AWLSublist01-Ex1a.htm
I have included a typical reading that you can practice with.
Wind Power
The power e power of the wind has been used for
centuries to directly drive various machines to perform such tasks as grinding
wheat or pumping water. Recently, however, the wind has joined other natural
forces such as water and steam as a viable method of generating electricity.
Traditional means of electricity generation using
coal or oil-fueled plants have two major drawbacks; they pollute the
environment and the fuels they use are inefficient and non-renewable. In
response to growing environmental awareness there have been calls for a greener
alternative. Nuclear power, while more efficient and less polluting, is seen by
many people as unacceptable, because of the danger of accidents such as those
that happened at Chernobyl or Three Mile Island. Wind power, however, is clean,
renewable and, with modern advances, surprisingly efficient.
In the 1970s Britain was in the forefront of
research into wind power. The interest in wind diminished in the 1980s due to
cheap North Sea oil, a strong pro-nuclear lobby and pricing structures that
made it uneconomical to set up wind farms. Britain, the windiest country in
Europe, had to wait until 1991 for its first wind farm. Located at Delabole in
Cornwall, the farm was originally the idea of locals who opposed the
construction of a nuclear power plant nearby and decided to set up a private
company to generate power for the area using the wind. They had to fight
opposition from local government and other local residents, who thought the
turbines would be noisy and might interfere with television signals, but eventually,
after showing local officials working wind farms in Denmark, they won and now
there are 10 huge white wind turbines on the Delabole hills.
It is in Germany and Denmark that the greatest
advances in wind power have come. Germany alone produces half of the wind
generated electricity in Europe. Every year Germany adds 400 Megawatts (Mw) of
capacity. In 2000 alone capacity expanded by 1669 Mw. Denmark now produces 30%
of its electricity from wind power and this is predicted to rise to 50% by
2010. Both countries have encouraged this growth by “fixed feed tariffs” which
guarantee a good price for private wind power operators.
The UK is catching up and the government has set
a target 10% of all electricity to come from renewable sources by 2010, half of
this to be from wind power. The 900 wind turbines in operation generate 400Mw
of electricity and to meet the target roughly 400Mw will need to be added each
year. With the advances in technology this is technically possible. Each
turbine can now produce 400 Kilowatts (KW) compared to only 70 KW at the start
of the 1980s. It will, however, need help from the government. This is being
done by offering financial support and giving private power companies targets
to meet.
Because many people feel wind farms spoil the
view and, also, because the wind is stronger at sea, many wind farms are now
being built offshore. They are usually built a few kilometres off the coast in
shallow water. The construction and maintenance costs are higher, but
electricity output is higher. The first in Britain was built in 2000 at Blyth,
north of Newcastle, and was the largest in the world until May 2001, when a 20
turbine farm was opened at Middelgruden off Copenhagen. There are plans to
construct up to 18 more in the UK by 2010. Together they will produce 800 Mw of
electricity annually.
The use of wind power is far less advanced in the
USA. Only .5% of America’s power comes from the wind, although it is estimated
that this could be increased to as high as 12% with no changes to the power
grid. However, there is an increased interest in wind power. There are plans to
build a huge offshore wind farm off the coast of Cape Cod on the North East
seaboard. The farm will take up over 25 square miles, have 170 turbines and
produce 420Mw at a cost of $600m. If constructed, it will be the world’s second
biggest wind farm, after the 520Mw farm planned in Ireland.
Choose the best answer to the questions
below.
1. People do not like coal and oil powered power
production because …
1. it damages the environment.
2. it is wasteful..
3. eventually it will run out.
4. all of the above.
2. Wind power …
1 has only been used recently.
2 promotes environmental awareness.
3 cleans the environment.
4 is not wasteful.
Complete the following summary of the
third paragraph from the IELTS sample reading using ONE OR TWO WORDS
from the reading texts.
British
Wind Power.
While
there was a great deal of interest in wind power in the 1970s, it (3)
_______________ in the 1980s. This was mainly due to intense support for (4)
_______________ power and little help in making wind power affordable. So, even
though Britain has some of the best winds in Europe, the first wind farm was
only built in 1991. The farm at Delabole came out of opposition by (5)
_______________ to a nuclear power plant. Initially, they were opposed by local
officials due to fears about noise and possible obstruction to (6)
________________ . This opposition was eventually overcome only after they were
shown successful examples from (7) _______________.
Now you are finished Reading you can practice your writing in check out my IELTS Writing entry
http://loop-language.blogspot.com/2014/12/ielts-writing-task-1-academic.html
