Can noncombustion (非燃烧) technology create a no-pollution way to drive？Imagine pulling into a service station to fuel up your car. But not at the gas pump or electric battery charger —at the air pump! That’s not hot air, either! The next generation of cars may run on thin air. Wouldn’t that be an incredible way to cut both pollution and dependence on foreign oil?
If you’ve ever inflated a balloon and then let it go, you’ve got the basics to test-drive the amazing MiniCAT, currently being developed by Noteur Development International (MDI), headquartered in Luxembourg. Invented by Formula One racing car designer Guy Negre, this experimental vehicle is unlike any car you’ve ever seen. While your family’s traditional car or SUV draws its horsepower using combustion, the only fuel that MiniCAT needs (CAT stands for Compressed Air Technology) is the air we breathe.
Start with about 25,000 gallons of air. Now, press it all into a space smaller than your school locker—because that’s the size of two super-strong, high-pressure air tanks, made from fiber and fixed beneath the air car.
Confining that much air inside those small tanks generates an internal pressure of over 4,000 pounds per square inch. That’s over 300 times normal air pressure.
When this cold, high-pressure air enters MiniCAT’s unique engine, it interacts(交互作用) with warmer air to create pressure waves that pump the engine’s engineered pistons (活塞) to move the car. MiniCAT’s projected top speed is 60 miles per hour, with a range of 120 miles on a full air supply.
小题1:What is the passage mainly about?
A．Ways to cut down air pollution.
B．Cars that run on thin air.
C．Formula One racing car designer.
D．Dependence on foreign oil.小题2:What is MiniCAT according to the passage?
A．The name of a car.
B．The name of a balloon.
C．The name of a car company.
D．The name of a car designer.小题3:The underlined world “Confining” in Paragraph 4 can be replaced by ___________.
A．Keeping
B．Preventing
C．Pushing
D．Running小题4:What does the last paragraph tell us?
A．How much pressure the air creates.
B．How the car works.
C．What the normal air pressure is.
D．How the air gets into the engine.
