单选题
The population of the United States is only 6% of the world"s population, but Americans
1
one third of all the energy
2
in the world. This fact alone says that Americans need to use less energy. And because the price of energy had been rising very rapidly
3
the limited supplies of oil in particular, Americans are becoming aware to the need to
4
energy. In California we have a California Energy Commission which has set up in the past five years to
5
plan for our future energy use. We have
6
laws in California to help us conserve energy. First of all, our houses in California have been very
7
of energy in the past. They were not
8
very carefully and so the heat would go out of the house very rapidly. Now we require that the homes have a
9
level of insulation, and so the homes built now are much more
10
.
11
, in transportation
12
a large percentage of oil energy is used, we need to develop more public transportation. In China, of course you have a very good public transportation system. And it is a (n)
13
for the kind of thing we need to develop more in the United States. Automobiles are also becoming more
14
. The smaller automobile with efficient engine can help to conserve a large amount of energy along with planning our
15
more carefully.
Many different studies have shown that we could
16
our energy consumption by
17
half or two thirds and still have the
18
quality of life. And many different types of technologies are currently being researched as to
19
they can be built to use
20
energy and still supply the same service.
【答案解析】[解析] 本题考查上下文连接。前半句和后半句的关系是因果关系，这句话的意思是：因为石油供应不足，所以能源价格飞速上涨。四个选项中，只有owing to表示因果关系，符合题意。其他三个选项的意思分别是resulting in“产生某种作用或结果”；in spite of“不管，不顾”；in the cause of“就……来说”。
【正确答案】
B
【答案解析】[解析] 本题考查词汇辨析。由于上一句讲能源价格上涨，所以美国人应该明白节约能源的重要性。题目中四个选项的意思分别是：consume“消耗，花费，耗尽”；conserve“保藏，保护，保存”；但这里和energy搭配，意思要发生变化，conserve energy的意思是“节约能源”，例如现在提倡建立节约型社会，正确的表达方式是：establish an Energy Conservation Community；exhaust“用完，耗尽”；retain“保留，保持”。结合上下文，选项B是最佳答案。