Hi Luschen! Would you please evaluate and greade my integrated essay. Thank you. I have a question too. I do not know weather I write much sentences from the reading in this essay or not? How many sentences we should write from the reading in each paragraph?
Reading
Car manufacturers and governments have been eagerly seeking a replacement for the automobile’s main source of power, the internal-combustion engine. By far the most promising alternative source of energy for cars is the hydrogen-based fuel-cell engine, which uses hydrogen to create electricity that, in turn, powers the car. Fuel-cell engines have several advantages over internal-combustion engines and will probably soon replace them.
One of the main problems with the internal-combustion engine is that it relies on petroleum, either in the form of gasoline or diesel fuel. Petroleum is a finite resource; someday, we will run out of oil. The hydrogen needed for fuel-cell engines cannot easily be depleted. Hydrogen can be derived from various plentiful sources, including natural gas and even water. The fact that fuel-cell engines utilize easily available, renewable resources makes them particularly attractive.
Second, hydrogen-based fuel cells are attractive because they will solve many of the world’s pollution problems. An unavoidable by-product of burning oil is carbon dioxide, and carbon dioxide harms the environment. On the other hand, the only byproduct of fuel-cell engines is water.
Third, fuel-cell engines will soon be economically competitive because people will spend less money to operate a fuel-cell engine than they will to operate an internal-combustion engine. This is true for one simple reason: a fuel-cell automobile is nearly twice as efficient in using its fuel as an automobile powered by an internal-combustion engine is. In other words, the fuel-cell powered car requires only half the fuel energy that the internal-combustion powered car does to go the same distance.
Listening
Professor:
The reading is correct in pointing out the problems associated with oil-powered cars. Yes, oil is a finite resource, and yes, burning oil harms the environment. However, the reading is way too optimistic in its assessment of hydrogen-based fuel-cell engines. Hydrogen is not the solution to these problems.
First, hydrogen is not as easily available as the passage indicates. Although it’s present in common substances like water, it’s not directly useable in that form. For using a fuel-cell engine, hydrogen must first be obtained in a pure liquid state. This pure liquid hydrogen is a highly artificial substance. It’s technologically very difficult to produce and store liquid hydrogen. For example, it must be kept very very cold at minus 253 degrees Celsius. Imagine the elaborate cooling technology that’s required for that! So hydrogen is not such a practical and easily available substance, is it?
Second, using hydrogen would not solve the pollution problems associated with cars. Why? Producing pure hydrogen creates a lot of pollution. To get pure hydrogen from water or natural gas, you have to use a purification process that requires lots of energy that’s obtained by burning coal or oil. And burning coal and oil creates lots of pollution. So although the cars would not pollute, the factories that generated the hydrogen for the cars would pollute.
Third, there won’t necessarily be any cost savings when you consider how expensive it is to manufacture the fuel-cell engine. That’s because fuel-cell engines require components made of platinum, a very rare and expensive metal. Without the platinum components in the engine, the hydrogen doesn’t undergo the chemical reaction that produces the electricity to power the automobile. All the efforts to replace platinum with a cheaper material have so far been unsuccessful.
My Essay
The article chiefly states that car manufacturers and governments try to use the hydrogen-based fuel-cell engine instead of petroleum-based engine for cars and they think that this ingenious idea will provide numerous benefits and the text bolsters that this idea with three reasons. In contrast, the lecturer contends that this mentality is completely debatable, citing three diverse reasons to contradict the points made in the reading passage.
First of all, the reading specifies that the internal-combustion engine uses from petroleum. Petroleum is a finite resource and we will definitely run out of it in future but hydrogen is more and it cannot easily be depleted. Conversely, it is stated by the speaker that this conclusion is definitely wrong because hydrogen resources are not usable simply and we need complicated technologies to extract hydrogen form these resources; consequently, the hydrogen is not so available.
Furthermore, it is emphasized in the text that using hydrogen instead of petroleum will solve the world’s pollution problems; nevertheless, the professor casts on doubt on this point by stating that the factories, which product hydrogen, will lead to pollution instead. He says that we need to extract hydrogen from his resources such as water and the factories, which do that, use petroleum and it causes pollution.
Finally, the reading passage makes it clear that hydrogen-based engines are cheaper that petroleum-based engines and people will prefer to use hydrogen for their cars. On the contrary, it is mentioned by the speaker that cars need to Platnom in their engine to can use hydrogen and Platnom is rare and expensive. So, he says that this idea is unsuccessful so far.
TOEFL listening lectures: Why does the lecturer mention Leonardo da Vinci?