【最新文档】雅思样题—Academic Reading-范文word版 (1页)

【最新文档】雅思样题—Academic Reading-范文word版

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雅思样题—Academic Reading

Academic Reading

Wind Power in the US

Prompted by the oil crises of the 1970 s , a wind - power industry flourished briefly in the United States . But then world oil prices dropped , and funding for research into renewable energy was cut . By the mid 1980 s US interest in wind energy as a large - scale source of energy had almost disappeared . The development of wind power at this time suffered not only from badly designed equipment , but also from poor long - term planning , economic projections that were too optimistic and the difficulty of finding suitable locations for the wind turbines .

Only now are technological advances beginning to offer hope that wind power will come to be accepted as a reliable and important source of electricity . There have been significant successes in California , in particular , where wind farms now have a capacity of 1500 megawatts , comparable to a large nuclear or fossil - fuelled power station , and produce 1.5 per cent of the states electricity .

Nevertheless , in the US , the image of wind power is still distorted by early failures . One of the most persistent criticisms

is that wind power is not a significant energy resource . Researchers at the Battelle Northwest Laboratory , however , estimate that today wind turbine technology could supply 20 per cent of the electrical power the country needs . As a local resource , wind power has even greater potential . Minnesotas energy commission calculates that a wind farm on one of the states south western ridges could supply almost all that states electricity . North Dakota alone has enough sites suitable for wind farms to supply more than a third of all electricity consumed in the continental US .