English Olympiad Class 8 - Sample paper 06

Passage 1

Renewable energy is a crucial aspect of addressing the growing concerns about environmental sustainability and climate change. Unlike traditional fossil fuels, renewable energy sources are derived from natural processes that are constantly replenished. One prominent source is solar energy, harnessed through the use of solar panels that convert sunlight into electricity. Another vital source is wind energy, generated by wind turbines that capture the kinetic energy of the wind. Both solar and wind energy contribute significantly to reducing greenhouse gas emissions and mitigating the impact of climate change.

Hydropower is another form of renewable energy that utilizes the energy of flowing or falling water to generate electricity. Dams and other infrastructure are employed to harness the power of water and convert it into a clean and sustainable energy source. Biomass, derived from organic materials such as plants and waste, is also utilized to produce bioenergy. This process involves the conversion of biomass into biofuels like ethanol or the direct burning of biomass to generate heat or electricity.

The adoption of renewable energy technologies not only helps combat climate change but also fosters economic growth and job creation. Governments, businesses, and individuals worldwide are increasingly investing in renewable energy infrastructure to transition towards a more sustainable and eco-friendly energy landscape.

Passage 2

A bird is a feathered animal. The covering of feathers is the only character common to all birds and not possessed by any other creature. The other characters—the bill, the wings, egg-laying, etc.—by which we usually distinguish birds from animals of other kinds are not exclusive bird characters. Turtles have beaks, and there is one species of mammal which has a bill like that of a duck. Many insects and one species of mammal (the bat) fly. Insects, fishes, and reptiles lay eggs, and there are several rare species of mammals that lay eggs and incubate them.

On the other hand, some birds are deficient in one or more of the typical bird characters. The ostrich cannot fly. The penguin can neither fly nor run, and cannot even walk well. The cuckoo lays its eggs in the nests of other birds, leaving to them the hatching and rearing of its young. These exceptional cases are very interesting. The characters which typically belong to birds attain their highest development in them. In most cases, this is due to peculiar adaptable features of their feathers.

While placing birds below mammals in a simple classification of animals, naturalists note that birds are the most distinct class in the animal kingdom. When we compare birds and the lower mammals, and the relations of each class to man we see at once that nothing else could take the place of birds either in nature or in civilisation. Among birds are found the highest developments of animal locomotion and of the natural voice. Birds also have the capacity for language far beyond that of other creatures (except man) and family and community relations resembling those of the human race.

In the history of the world, mammals have been more useful to man than birds. But birds have given him some of his best ideas. With the advance of civilisation, the lower mammals become less necessary and birds more necessary to him. It has been said that “on the earth and on the sea, man has attained the powers of locomotion with which, in strength, endurance, and velocity, no animal movement can compare. But the air is an element on which he cannot travel, an ocean which he cannot navigate. The birds of heaven are still his envy, and on the paths they tread he cannot follow.” Since that was written practical flying machines have been invented. But in these, as in boats and ships, man has merely devised a machine which under his control can do laboriously and at great risk what the bird does naturally and easily. To birds man is indebted for his first lessons in navigating the water as well as for his ideas about airships.

Passage 3

When I was twelve or thirteen years old, an uncle of mine who gave me my love for books and pictures promised to take me upon a memorable expedition. I was to go with him to the top of the tower in their village.

And so, one fine day, a sexton with a large key opened a mysterious door. “Ring the bell,” he said, “when you come back and want to get out,” and with a great grinding of rusty old hinges he separated us from the noise of the busy street and locked us into a world of new and strange experiences.

For the first time in my life I was confronted by the phenomenon of audible silence. When we had climbed the first flight of stairs, I added another discovery to my limited knowledge of natural phenomena—that of tangible darkness. A match showed us where the upward road continued. We went to the next floor and then to the next and the next until I had lost count and then there came still another floor, and suddenly we had plenty of light.

This floor was on an even height with the roof of the church, and it was used as a storeroom. Covered with many inches of dust, there lay the abandoned objects discarded by the good people of the city many years ago. That which had meant life and death to our ancestors was here reduced to junk and rubbish. The industrious rat had built his nest among the carved images and the ever watchful spider had opened up shop between the outspread arms of a kindly saint.

The next floor showed us from where we had derived our light. Enormous open windows with heavy iron bars made the high and barren room the roosting place of hundreds of pigeons. The wind blew through the iron bars and the air was filled with a weird and pleasing music. It was the noise of the town below us, but a noise which had been purified and cleansed by the distance. The rumbling of heavy carts and the clinking of horses’ hoofs, the winding of cranes and pulleys—they had all been blended into a softly rustling whisper which provided a beautiful background for the trembling cooing of the pigeons.