2013年12月7日托福阅读真题解析.doc

2013年12月7日托福阅读真题解析
第一篇
TOPIC 美国地理对经济的影响
讲落基山对美国经济的影响，主要是水分与土质，产生了有个大平原；后来又提到风吹来了其他地方的优质土壤。还提到冻土层tundra的影响。后面又讲了了几个方面，包括农业、开采矿物等。
解析：本文属于地质学和经济学话题交叉的文章，主要谈及美国地理情况。本文考生回忆普遍较少，文章相对较难，同时很多同学反馈说第一段非常长，造成阅读困难。面对这一情况，建议大家在考试中灵活调整做题顺序，尤其是在刚刚开考时遇到长段落导致阅读压力较大时，可选择暂时跳过，先做后面题目，通过文章前后之间的关联给自己更多提示。
The Rocky Mountains
The Rocky Mountains, commonly known as the Rockies, are a major mountain range in western North America. The Rocky Mountains stretch more than 3,000 miles (4,830 km) from the northernmost part of British Columbia, in western Canada, to New Mexico, in the southwestern United States. Within the North American Cordillera, the Rockies are somewhat distinct from the Pacific Coast Ranges and the Cascade Range and Sierra Nevada which all lie farther to the west.
Economic resources of the Rocky Mountains are varied and abundant. Minerals found in the Rocky Mountains include significant deposits of copper, gold, lead, molybdenum, silver, tungsten, and zinc. The Wyoming Basin and several smaller areas contain significant reserves of coal, natural gas, oil shale, and petroleum. For example, the Climax mine, located near Leadville, Colorado, was the largest producer of molybdenum in the world. Molybdenum is used in heat-resistant steel in such things as cars and planes. The Climax mine employed over 3,000 workers. The Coeur d'Alene mine of northern Idaho produces silver, lead, and zinc. Canada's largest coal mines are near Fernie, British Columbia and Sparwood, British Columbia; additional coal mines exist near Hinton, Alberta, and in the Northern Rockies surrounding Tumbler Ridge, British Columbia.
Abandoned mines with their wakes of mine tailings and toxic wastes dot the Rocky Mountain landscape. In one major example, eighty years of zinc mining profoundly polluted the river and bank near Eagle River in north-central Colorado. High concentrations of the metal carried by spring runoff harmed algae, moss, and trout populations. An economic analysis of mining e