学术综合英语unit2

Energy in Transition

The era of cheap and convenient sources of energy is coming to an end. A transition to more expensive but less polluting sources must now be managed.

John P. Holdren

能源转型

能源资源价格低廉、使用便捷的时代已经过去，目前应向尽管价格较高、但污染较小的资源转变。

约翰·P·霍德雷恩Understanding this transition requires a look at the two-sided connection between energy and human well-being. Energy contributes positively to well-being by providing such consumer services as heating and lighting as well as serving as a necessary input to economic production. But the costs of energy －including not only the money and other resources devoted to obtaining and exploiting it but also environmental and sociopolitical impacts －detract from well-being.

了解这一转变，需首先考察一下能源和人类幸福的双重关系。从积极的意义上说，能源为人类幸福作出了贡献，它为经济生产活动提供必要投入的同时，也提供了诸如取暖、照明等消费服务。然而，人类为利用能源所付出的代价却削弱了能源为其带来的利益，这种代价不但包括为获取和利用能源所投入的资金和其他资源，而且包含了能源开发和利用所产生的环境影响和社会政治影响。

For most of human history, the dominant concerns about energy have centered on the benefit side of the energy －well-being equation. Inadequacy of energy resources or (more often) of the technologies and organizations for harvesting, converting, and distributing those resources has meant insufficient energy benefits and hence inconvenience, deprivation and constraints on growth. The 1970’s, then, represented a turning p oint. After decades of constancy or decline in monetary costs －and of relegation of environmental and sociopolitical costs to secondary status －energy was seen to be getting costlier in all respects.It began to be plausible that excessive energy costs could pose threats on a par with those of insufficient supply. It also became possible to think that expanding some forms of energy supply could create costs exceeding the benefits.

人类历史发展长河中，人们主要关心的是能源和人类安康等式关系中有利的一面。能源资源不足或者（更经常）开采、加工和分配这些资源所需技术与机构的不足，会影响能源为人类带来利益，同时意味着能源的增长遭到干扰、损害或限制。到了20世纪70年代，出现了一个转折点。此前的几十年中，能源的资金成本一直保持稳定，甚或有所下降，而且，其所牵扯的环境成本和社会政治成本一直处于次要地位。但20世纪70年代开始，开发和利用能源的多方成本均显著增长。人们自然有理由认为：高昂的能源成本所带来的威胁已同能源供应不足所产生的危险不相上下。同时，也有人担心，依靠扩大能源资源增加供应所需付出的代价，也许大于其所带来的利益。

The crucial question at the beginning of the 1990’s is whether the trend that began in the 1970’s will prove to be temporary or permanent. Is the era of cheap energy really over, or will a combination of new resources, new technology and changing geopolitics bring it back? One key determinant of the answer is the staggering scale of energy demand brought forth by 100 years of unprecedented population growth, coupled with an equally remarkable growth in per capita demand of industrial energy forms. It entailed the use of dirty coal as well as clean; undersea oil as well as terrestrial; deep gas as well as shallow; mediocre hydroelectric sites as well as good ones; and deforestation as well as sustainable fuelwood harvesting.

20世纪90年代初期人们关注的焦点在于这种始于70年代的能源发展趋势是暂时的还

是长远的。廉价能源时代是真正一去不复返，还是通过开发新能源、应用新技术、改革地缘政治秩序等措施，有可能重登历史舞台？回答这个问题的一个关键因素是过去100年以来因人口空前增长带来令人瞠目的能源需求以及同样使人无从应对的人均工业能源需求。急剧增长的能源需求使得人类对能源的使用无所不用其极：不管是清洁煤炭还是劣质煤炭，见煤就挖；无论是陆上石油还是海底石油，深层气还是浅层气，见油气就采；水电站建设不论适宜与否，见水就上；一边绿化造林以求燃料树木可持续发展，一边却砍树毁林。

Except for the huge pool of oil underlying the Middle East, the cheapest oil and gas are already gone. Even if a few more giant oil fields are discovered, they will make little difference against consumption on today’s scale.Oil and gas will have to come increasingly, for most countries, from deeper in the earth and from imports whose reliability and affordability cannot be guaranteed.

除了中东地区蕴藏着巨大的石油资源，地球上廉价的油气资源已经不复存在。即使偶尔找到几个大油田，同当今巨大的能源消耗相比，也是杯水车薪。对于大多数国家来说，油气资源越来越多地依赖于深层埋藏，越来越多地依赖进口，且不说进口油气资源的可靠性无法得到保障，其对进口国的支付能力也是一个考验。

There are a variety of other energy resources that are more abundant than oil and gas. Coal, solar energy, and fission and fusion fuels are the most important ones. But they all require elaborate and expensive transformation into electricity or liquid fuels in o rder to meet society’s needs. None has very good prospects for delivering large quantities of electricity at costs comparable to those of the cheap coal-fired and hydropower plants of the 1960’s. It appears, then, that expensive energy is a permanent condition, even without allowing for its environmental costs.

诚然，其他许多资源的储藏量大于石油和天然气，最重要的有煤、太阳能、聚变裂变燃料等。但这些资源转化成电力或液体燃料，以满足社会需求，均需经过技术复杂、成本昂贵的转化过程。同20世纪60年代成本低廉的燃煤火电站和水力发电站相比，仅从成本角度考虑，以上各种资源用于大规模发电的可能性极小。因此，即使不考虑能源开采的环保成本，能源价格居高不下已成无可改变的定局。

The capacity of the environment to absorb the effluents and other impacts of energy technologies is itself a finite resource. The finitude is manifested in two basic types of environmental costs. External costs are those imposed by environmental disruptions on society but not reflected in the monetary accounts of the buyers and sellers of the energy. “Internalized costs” are increases in monetary costs imposed by measures, such as pollution-control devices, aimed at reducing the external costs.

环境吸纳由于能源利用而产生的废弃物和其他影响的能力本身也是有限度的，表现在两方面的环境成本上。所谓“外延成本”即由于环境遭到破坏对社会产生的影响，但尚未反映到能源买卖双方的交易价格上；所谓“内涵成本”即为降低外延成本而采取各种措施（如污染防治措施）所引起的资金成本的增长。

Both types of environmental costs have been rising for several reasons. First, the declining quality of fuel deposits and energy-conversion sites to which society must now turn means more material must be moved or processed, bigger facilities must be constructed and longer distances must be traversed. Second, the growing magnitude of effluents from energy systems has led to saturation of the e nvironment’s capacity to absorb such effluents without disruption. Third, the monetary costs of controlling pollution tend to increase with the percentage of pollutants removed.

两种环境成本均一直呈增长趋势，原因是多方面的。首先，社会发展所依赖的燃料矿藏和加工地质量下降，必然要求矿物运输和加工的数量增加、设施扩大、运输距离延长。第二，

利用能源所产生的废弃物不断增加，使得环境不遭破坏地吸纳废弃物的能力达到了极限。第三，污染防治所需的资金成本亦将随着消除污染源比例的提高而提高。

Despite these expenditures, the remaining uninternalized environmental costs have been substantial and in many cases are growing. Those of greatest concern are the risk of death or disease as a result of emissions or accidents at energy facilities and the impact of energy supplied on the global ecosystem and on international relations.

尽管代价高昂，尚未内化的环境成本一直居高不下，并在许多情形下呈增长趋势，其中最引人关注的是由能源设施排放废物或发生事故所带来的死亡和疾病，以及由于能源供应对于全球生态系统和国际关系所造成的影响。

The impacts of energy technologies on public health and safety are difficult to pin down with much confidence. In the case of air pollution from fossil fuels, in which the dominant threat to public health is thought to be particulates formed from sulfur dioxide emissions, a consensus on the number of deaths caused by exposure has proved impossible. Widely differing estimates result from different assumptions about fuel compositions, air pollution control technology, power-plant sitting in relation to population distribution, meteorological conditions affecting sulfate formation, and, above all, the relation between sulfate concentrations and disease.

能源技术对于大众健康和安全所造成的影响难以确定。以矿物燃料造成的空气污染为例，一般认为其对大众健康的主要危害是由排放的二氧化硫形成的微粒，但接触这种污染空气究竟会导致多少人死亡，却无法取得一致意见。各种估算数据千差万别，原因在于对以下各种因素的分析各不相同，比如燃料构成、空气污染防治技术、发电厂选址同人口分布间的关系、气象条件对硫化物形成的影响，最重要的是硫化物的聚集同疾病之间的关系。

Large uncertainties also apply to the health and safety impacts of nuclear fission. In this case, differing estimates result in part from differences among sites and reactor types, in part from uncertainties about emissions from fuel-cycle steps that are not yet fully operational (especially fuel reprocessing and management of uranium-mill tailings) and in part from different assumptions about the effects of exposure to low-dose radiation. The biggest uncertainties, however, relate to the probabilities and consequences of large accidents at reactors, at reprocessing plants and in the transport of wastes.

同样，核反应堆对于大众健康和安全的影响亦无法确定。对此种影响的各种分析，既有来自关于反应堆选址和类型的不同观点，又有因为核燃料反应过程中各个环节所产生的废弃物究竟会产生何种影响尚无法确定，尤其是燃料重新加工过程以及铀浓缩工厂废料处理的影响无法确定；同时还有因为对于人类接触少量核辐射所造成的后果各执己见。然而，最大的不确定性来自核反应堆、重新加工工厂以及核废料运输过程中可能发生重大事故的概率及其所造成的后果。

Altogether, the ranges of estimated hazards to public health from both coal-fired and nuclear-power plants are so wide as to extend from negligible to substantial in comparison with other risks to the population. There is little basis, in these ranges, for preferring one of these energy sources over the other. For both, the very size of the uncertainty is itself a significant liability.

同人类所面临的其他威胁相比，火电厂和核电厂危害大众健康的程度究竟多大，众说纷纭，莫衷一是。有的人认为这种影响微不足道，可以忽略不计；也有人认为这种影响程度严重、危害巨大。无论影响大小，都没有理由对其中种种能源亲此疏彼。无论是核电还是火电，其对人类的危害都无法确定，这本身就是一大憾事。

Often neglected, but no less important, is the public health menace from traditional fuels

widely used for cooking and water heating in the developing world. Perhaps 80 percent of global exposure to particulate air pollution occurs indoors in developing countries, where the smoke from primitive stoves is heavily laden with dangerous hydrocarbons. A disproportionate share of this burden is borne, moreover, by women (who do the cooking) and small children (who indoors with their mothers).

发展中国家普遍用于做饭烧水的传统燃料对大众健康造成的危害常常不为人们所关注，但同样十分严重。全球大约80%的颗粒空气污染来自发展中国家的室内烧煮，原始简陋的炉灶排出的烟气含有大量有害的烃，而且忍受这种有害物质的大多数为妇女（室内烧煮的主要承担者）和儿童（长时间同母亲一直呆在室内）。

The ecological threats posed by energy supply are even harder to quantify than the threats to human health and safety from effluents and accidents. Nevertheless, enough is known to suggest they portend even larger damage to human well-being. This damage potential arises from the combination of two circumstances.

同排放的废弃物和事故对大众健康造成的危害相比，能源利用对生态系统的威胁更难以量化。然而，根据已有认识足以判断这种威胁对人类利益造成的损失将会更大。造成这种潜在的损失的原因是以下两种情形同时存在。

First, civilization depends heavily on services provided by ecological and geophysical processes such as building and fertilizing soil, regulating water supply, controlling pests and pathogens, and maintaining a tolerable climate; yet it lacks the knowledge and the resources to r eplace nature’s services with technology. Second, human activities are now clearly capable of disrupting globally the processes that provide these services. Energy supply, both industrial and traditional, is responsible for a striking share of the environmental impacts of human activity. The environmental transition of the past 100 years －driven above all by a 20-fold increase in fossil-fuel use and augmented by a tripling in the use of traditional energy forms －has amounted to no less than the emergence of civilization as a global ecological and geochemical force.

首先，人类文明严重依赖于由各种生态和地球物理过程所提供的各种服务，诸如土地耕作、施肥、供水设施、病虫害防治、维持能够忍受的气候等等。但是，人类却缺乏知识和资源来利用技术代替自然界所提供的各种服务。其次，人类活动已显而易见地能够在全球范围破坏提供这些服务的进程。无论是工业形式还是传统家庭的能源利用，在人类活动破坏环境的进程中均占有很大比重。过去100年以来的环境改变巨大（首要因素是化石燃料的使用增长至20倍，同时传统家庭能源使用增长至3倍），足以体现当今人类文明的是一支正在全球范围内崛起的生态和地球化学力量。

Of all environmental problems, the most threatening, and in many respects the most intractable, is global climate change. And the greenhouse gases most responsible for the danger of rapid climate change come largely from human endeavors too massive, widespread and central to the functioning of our societies to be easily altered: carbon dioxide (CO2) from deforestation and the combustion of fossil fuels; methane from rice paddies, cattle gusts and the exploitation of oil and natural gas; and nitrous oxides from fuel combustions and fertilizer use.

在诸多环境问题中，对人类威胁最大、在许多情况下却又最让人类无计可施的是全球气候变化。而对气候快速变化最起作用的温室气体主要来自人类活动，这些活动规模之大、范围之广、对人类社会运转作用之大，都无法轻易改变。这些气体包括：由于毁林和燃烧矿物燃料所造成的二氧化碳。由秸秆、牲畜粪便和使用石油天然气所排放的甲烷，以及由于燃料燃烧和施肥所排放的氧化氮。

The only other external cost that might match the devastating impact of global climate change is the risk of causing or aggravating large-scale military conflict. One such threat is the potential for conflict over access to petroleum resources. Another threat is the link between nuclear energy and the spread of nuclear weapons. The issue is hardly less complex and controversial than the link between CO2and climate; many analysts, including me, think it is threatening indeed.

其他唯一能够同全球气候变化所造成的灾难性影响相提并论的外化成本是日益恶化的大规模军事冲突。其中潜在的威胁是为争夺石油资源而引起的冲突。另一个威胁则来自核能和核武器扩散之间的联系，这种联系的复杂性几乎不亚于二氧化碳和气候之间的关系。许多分析家（包括本人）均认为这种关系十分危险.