Student’s worksheet
American Chemical Society, October 07
Article: Carbon capture
Fill in the gaps!
Start time : 2’13
End time : 4’20
Thanks to a new gadget that _________ carbon dioxide pollution right out of the air,
scientists may be able to reduce the environmental _________ caused by hundreds of
millions of cars worldwide.
Cars and electric _________ release billions of tons of carbon dioxide or CO2 into the
air every year.
The amounts of this colorless, _________ gas have been increasing and contributing to
_________ _________.
Unusual amounts of CO2 have been _________ in the atmosphere for a long time.
Now, CO2 acts like a huge invisible blanket, trapping the sun’s heat so that the earth’s
climate gets warmer and levels of CO2 in the air may double in the years ahead.
About half of the carbon dioxide pollution comes from the _________ of electric
powerplants that burn coal.
Scientists are working hard on technology that can capture and store that CO2 before
it gets into the air. Unfortunately, there is no good way of catching CO2 that’s already
in the air from other sources including the _________ of cars and trucks.
Once CO2 gets into the air, it spreads out like a drop of food _________ in a swimming
pool full of water.
If you removed all the CO2 from the air inside a huge _________ box car for instance,
you’d wind up with only 2 _________ of CO2.
A New York Scientist, Dr Frank Zeman may have a solution to this big problem. Dr
Zeman’s machine _________ up carbon dioxide that’s spread out in the air around us.
His so-called “air _________ systems” could be installed anywhere outdoors trapping
_________ CO2 from cars, forest fires and other sources like a big _________
_________!
Dr Zeman figured out a way of using natural _________, or air currents, to bring
gigantic amounts of air into the machine without using a lot of energy. By spreading
these machines all over the _________, Zeman’s Carbon Vacuum could be an enormous
help at lowering the earth’s carbon dioxide levels.
For our _________ planet, this could be very cool news indeed! ☺
Cécile CANU - Emilangues 2010 1
New vocabulary and expressions
Find a translation for the following:
English French
To slurp up
damage
worlwide
Electric powerplants
billions
Global warming
Have been collecting in the atmosphere..
Huge blanket
trapping
smokestacks
coal
Tailpipes of trucks
To spread out
Food coloring
A railroad box car
To wind up with
An ounce
outdoors
To trap
A vacuum cleaner
To figure out a way of using
Natural draughts
Questions and debate :
-Where do carbon dioxide emissions come from ?
-What does Dr Zeman’s machine do ?
-Does this recording help you understand how the machine works ?
-Does this miraculous invention need energy ? Where would you find such an amount ?
Cécile CANU - Emilangues 2010 2
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