Read the given passage and answer the following questions based on it.…
2023
Read the given passage and answer the following questions based on it.
Emissions of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases plunged 4.6 percent in 2020, as lockdowns in the first half of the year restricted global mobility and hampered economic activity. Many hoped that this would mark the beginning of a more permanent shift downwards in emissions. Emissions from the manufacturing and the energy sectors contributed the most to recent global increases based on updated information from the IMF’s Climate Change Indicators Dashboard—a joint effort among national and international statistical organizations to provide timely data to help monitor the transition to lower carbon use. As greenhouse gas emissions from human activities increase, they build up in the atmosphere and warm the climate, leading to many other changes around the world—in the atmosphere, on land, and in the oceans. While total emissions have climbed significantly above prepandemic levels, increases from transportation and households were more muted last year as the pandemic weighed on global mobility. This was particularly evident with the emergence of the omicron variant in the fourth quarter of last year. The public health policy measures in many countries drove down the emissions of households and of the electricity sector.
It will be important to monitor the emissions of both of these sectors as economies fully reopen in the context of historically high fossil fuel-based energy prices. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change has said that, in the scenarios they assessed, limiting atmospheric warming to the key level of around 1.5 degrees Celsius requires global greenhouse gas emissions to peak by 2025 at the latest, emphasizing that achieving this milestone is a crucial step towards controlling the severity of climate change. The new data from the climate dashboard underscore what some scientists have warned: time is running out, and we must urgently bend the emissions curve to achieve the necessary reductions to limit atmospheric warming.
According to the passage, why did greenhouse gas emissions decrease in 2020?
- A.
Reduced emissions from manufacturing and energy sectors
- B.
The introduction of a global policy capping greenhouse gas emissions by 30%
- C.
Global mobility restrictions and a decline in economic activity due to lockdown
- D.
Increased use of renewable energy sources
- E.
The emergence of the Climate Change Indicators Dashboard
Attempted by 1 students.
Show answer & explanation
Correct answer: C
Concept
Reading-comprehension questions are answered strictly from what the passage states, not from outside knowledge. To find a cause-and-effect detail, locate the exact sentence in the passage that links the effect (here, the 2020 drop in emissions) to its stated cause, and match that wording to an option.
Application
The opening sentence of the passage states that emissions “plunged 4.6 percent in 2020, as lockdowns in the first half of the year restricted global mobility and hampered economic activity.” The word “as” signals the cause: the lockdowns curbed movement and slowed economic activity. The option that paraphrases this — mobility restrictions and a decline in economic activity caused by lockdowns — is therefore the answer.
Why the other choices do not fit
Reduced emissions from manufacturing and energy sectors: the passage says the opposite — manufacturing and energy “contributed the most to recent global increases,” so they raised emissions, not lowered them.
A global policy capping emissions by 30%: no such 30% cap or policy is mentioned anywhere in the passage; it is invented detail.
Increased use of renewable energy sources: the passage never attributes the 2020 fall to renewables; this cause does not appear in the text.
The emergence of the Climate Change Indicators Dashboard: the dashboard is described only as a data-monitoring tool from the IMF, not as a cause of any emissions change.