Shadowing Practice: IASNR 2022 Conference Presentation - Learn English Speaking with Video
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Hi, my name is Chad McGuire, and this is my presentation on an analysis of sulfur emission reductions in the United States between 1990
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and 2014 using a disproportionality framework.
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In terms of an overview, uh, There is a regulatory natural experiment in sulfur emissions in the United States that we can look at,
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and it began in 1990 when the United States federal government passed the Clean Air Act amendments of 1990.
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And the regulatory mechanism that creates this natural experiment is the cap and trade program.
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Cap and trade has been used in a number of ways.
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globally by different governments, but here in the United States in particular, cap and trade was the main mechanism that was used in the 1990 Clean Air Act amendments.
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And as a matter of using that cap and trade framework, we can review reductions over time.
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between high and low socioeconomic status communities.
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So using the cap and trade scenario, we can look at the effect of cap and trade.
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in terms of its
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proportionality or disproportionality between communities and what that means quite simply is
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that as we see the cap
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and trade play itself out over time since 1990 we can
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look at areas where emission levels of certain particular sulfur as an example of a pollutant
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that has an impact on human well -being we can look at those the numbers of the proportions
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of sulfur emissions over time since 1990
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and we can see relatively speaking where they diminished
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and where they might not have diminished as quickly in certain communities so we can look for evidence of disproportionality so
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Operational characteristics are we can look for, for example, for the socio -economic status communities, higher unemployment, lower educational attainment,
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higher consumption of means tested public services and offering greater demographic diversity.
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These characteristics are the things
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that we would look at to determine low socio -economic status communities
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when we're looking at the relative changes in sulfur emissions from the cap and trade program between different geographic regions.
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And disproportionality itself, we can operationally or operationally defined as evidence of distributional effects of environmental policies.
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So where we see some change, some variance in reductions, let's call that, reductions of sulfur emissions over time.
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So for cap and trade in particular, the cap, we can look at as a government mandate and then the trade market forces.
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So we have the opportunity for distributional effects because the cap part is a government mandate.
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That's a requirement.
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So we cap total amounts of emissions, but then the trade can allow us to see how those changes,
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those reductions as the cap reduces total emissions, where there might be changes in one area versus another.
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You might actually see increases in some areas where you see substantial reductions in others.
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And then you'd look at what those areas look like, what that community looks like, and whether or not it shows signs of,
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as we've defined operationally here, low socioeconomic status.
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Michael Shachm: And so, as a matter of overall CAP is reduced government function, but what is the distribution of emissions and trading phase over time between socio economic status communities.
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- Yeah.
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For the purposes of the study, in particular.
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located in Massachusetts and so looked at Massachusetts communities instead of a nationwide
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because there's too much variance say between states it's too difficult
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so we looked at communities at the county level
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and then specific communities largest emitters within counties so we compared those counties
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and the communities within those counties
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and Massachusetts as a way to try to determine disproportionality the big questions what factors may be influencing the observance or
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What factors might be influencing it?
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What policy implications arise from this analysis?
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And in terms of the research focus framework questions that we have derived from previous work, Collins, Munos, and Zsa Zsa in particular,
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whether the producer disproportionality are present across the study area.
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So do we find disproportionality at all between these Massachusetts communities, these let's call them county level communities.
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And if disproportionality are found, what is the demographic makeup of those communities, and are they consistent?
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So if we do find disproportionality between communities, How do those communities look from a demographic standpoint?
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In terms of data and results, so here we have a table that we derived from looking at the different sulfur emissions,
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and these are the years in which we can find changes
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and new updates in terms of the United States Environmental Protection Agency national emissions inventory.
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So these are the years that we can find between 1990 and 2014 where we're given these specific particular changes.
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What we find is that in Massachusetts, if you look, you can see that in 1990, these are in the millions, so it's 2 .33 million.
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And we see a reduction down to 3544 metric tons, which is significant.
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So we see an overall significant reduction.
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The cap and trade program was very effective in reducing between 1990 and 2014 the amount of sulfur overall in Massachusetts. than others.
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And so we can look at those counties
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and make a determination of the levels of reduction from these periods of time from 1990 to 1996,
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from 1996, 1997, so on and so forth, and look at how those reductions.
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We can see there were substantial overall reductions between 1990 and 2014,
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but the question is, what does the path look like between these years where the measurements were made, and what does the path look like in relationship to that?
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relating these counties to what we have identified as Bristol County
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as our low socioeconomic status community these are the five counties within Massachusetts
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that have the largest relatively large levels we excluded Suffolk County for various reasons
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but it was basically done within between 1990 and 1996 but
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which had the largest levels and we can see distribution patterns
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and compare them honestly between each other of these five counties over the period of time
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The reason Bristol County is chosen as our low socioeconomic status or the community, the relative community with disproportionality is because relative to the other,
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counties as you can see here in the scatter plots you
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can see the other counties bristol county shows relative to its amount of emissions here the tons of sulfur emissions
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and we can look at a certain demographics that we're able to get which includes population unemployment rate percent below poverty
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and percent of high school graduate or higher.
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We see the Bristol County basically contains these demographic indicators in terms of overall poverty level,
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overall percentage relative to the other counties.
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Bristol County has higher emissions, relative to the other counties, and it tends to be,
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it tends to have higher unemployment rates and lower education rates, the things that you would indicate to be a low socioeconomic status community in relationship to these other areas.
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So that's why Bristol County ends up being our county of choice.
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And so when we sort of look at these distribution patterns over time of those years that we discussed,
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1990, 96, 97, so these years where the EPA inventory looked at the sulfur emissions, we can see we have substantial reductions,
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relatively speaking, and including Bristol County, which I think, excuse me, which we can see here in the yellow Bristol County's reductions.
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here.
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So effectively what's happening is that the burden, if you think about it this way, as you're reducing sulfur emissions, if you're not doing technological advances,
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if you're not going to put in expensive scrubbers to remove the sulfur, you're probably going to start shutting down and transitioning from coal to other methods of generating electricity,
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where most of the sulfur emissions come from is the burning of coal.
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And so what's happening is the other counties that That's Bristol County.
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They're either shutting down or they're reducing pretty substantially within about a decade or so,
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and Bristol County is taking the sort of brunt of that.
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So if there's a need for still generating electricity using coal, relatively speaking, a cheap version for the state.
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writ large that you're going to see Bristol County.
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The evidence shows that Bristol County did not have the same rates in between these years in particular, the same rates of reductions.
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And you can see that
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if you look at Massachusetts here in the green relative to Massachusetts reductions relative to Bristol County, its reductions.
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You see again, there's this burden
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that Bristol County seems to be taking on relative to the
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rest of the state in terms of maintaining a certain level of emissions.
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What that means effectively if we look at this is that the cap and trade can be effective at pollution reduction.
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It certainly was in Massachusetts.
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It was nationally, you know, in terms of reducing emissions significantly sulfur, which carries all kinds of important implications,
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but cap sets mandatory target.
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which is important because you can lower the cap every year, every period of time.
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And then the trade allows for important market incentives and choice.
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So it allows for a lot of room in terms of how generators, those that burn sulfur, coal, that contain sulfur, how they're going to meet that objective.
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But the process is far from equal.
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And that's what the evidence shows us in this study.
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So the evidence is the burden of reduction tends to fall disproportionately on marginalized communities.
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In our case, Bristol County bore most of the burden of reducing.
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It same reduction, the same levels of reduction as the other communities.
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And so that's an important point for the trade portion, at least, because it's not equal amongst communities.
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And so we must understand this reality when we're thinking about policy design and implementation.
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We must look beyond the ultimate goals and see how the process of obtaining those goals, what happens along the way.
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And that's really important to think about from a policy standpoint when we thinking about the role of environmental policies.
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That's all.
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I hope you enjoyed.
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Thank you very much.
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Thank you.
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Vocabulary and speaking notes for this lesson
This C1 speaking lesson is built on the video “IASNR 2022 Conference Presentation”. The speaker keeps coming back to these words: reduction, emission, cap, communities, county. This video has 117 sentences and 1669 words to shadow. The speech runs for 11:06. The speaker talks at a natural 150 words per minute, close to everyday conversation. 83% of the words are among the 3,000 most common in English; the rest is worth studying before you start.
Key vocabulary in this video
The 15 most advanced words in the video, with pronunciation and meaning:
| Word | Pronunciation | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| emission noun | /ɪˈmɪʃ.ən/ | Something which is emitted or sent out; issue. |
| sulfur noun | /ˈsʌl.fə/ | A chemical element with atomic number 16, having a bright yellow color and characteristic smell, used commercially in a variety of products such as… |
| disproportionality noun | The state of being disproportional. | |
| demographic adjective | /ˌdɛm.əˈɡɹæf.ɪk/ | Of or pertaining to demography. |
| operationally adverb | In an operational manner; in accordance with an operation. | |
| socio noun | At an institute of education, a class where sociology is taught. | |
| diminish verb | /dɪˈmɪnɪʃ/ | To make smaller. |
| distributional adjective | /ˌdɪs.tɹəˈbjuː.ʃə.nəl/ | Of or pertaining to distribution |
| variance noun | /ˈvæɹ.i.əns/ | The act of varying or the state of being variable. |
| derive verb | /dɪˈɹaɪv/ | To obtain or receive (something) from something else. |
| implication noun | /ˌɪmpləˈkeɪʃən/ | The act of implicating. |
| standpoint noun | /ˈstændpɔɪnt/ | A point of view; a perspective. |
| mandate noun | /ˈmændeɪ̯t/ | An official or authoritative command; an order or injunction; a commission; a judicial precept; an authorization. |
| characteristic noun | /ˌkæɹ(ə)ktəˈɹɪstɪk/ | A distinguishing feature of a person or thing, a part of mental or physical behavior. |
| attainment noun | /əˈteɪnmənt/ | The act of attaining; the act of arriving at or reaching; the act of obtaining by effort or exertion. |
Phrasal verbs you will hear
| Word | Meaning |
|---|---|
| shut down verb | To close, terminate, or end; to stop operating, either permanently or temporarily. |
| end up verb | To bring to a conclusion. |
Grammar in this video
The structures the speaker uses most, with the exact words from the video:
| Structure | In the video |
|---|---|
| Present perfect have/has + past participle — a past action that still matters now | has been · we've defined · have derived |
| Passive voice be + past participle — the focus is on what happens, not who does it | is reduced · are found · were made |
Pronunciation to watch
The speaker uses 14 contractions and reduced forms, such as you're, we're, they're. Say them the short way, as you hear them.
- The “sh” and “zh” sounds: emission /ɪˈmɪʃ.ən/, diminish /dɪˈmɪnɪʃ/, distributional /ˌdɪs.tɹəˈbjuː.ʃə.nəl/, implication /ˌɪmpləˈkeɪʃən/, disproportionately /ˈdɪs.pɹəˌpɔɹ.ʃən.ət.li/
- Long words — get the stress right: demographic /ˌdɛm.əˈɡɹæf.ɪk/, distributional /ˌdɪs.tɹəˈbjuː.ʃə.nəl/, implication /ˌɪmpləˈkeɪʃən/, characteristic /ˌkæɹ(ə)ktəˈɹɪstɪk/, disproportionately /ˈdɪs.pɹəˌpɔɹ.ʃən.ət.li/
How to practise with this video
- Listen to the whole video once without speaking and note the words you do not know.
- Start at 0.75× speed, shadow it sentence by sentence, then go back to normal speed once it feels easy.
- Record yourself and compare with the original, paying attention to words like emission, sulfur, disproportionality.
What is the Shadowing Technique?
Shadowing is a science-backed language learning technique originally developed for professional interpreter training and popularized by polyglot Dr. Alexander Arguelles. The method is simple but powerful: you listen to native English audio and immediately repeat it out loud — like a shadow following the speaker with just a 1–2 second delay. Unlike passive listening or grammar drills, shadowing forces your brain and mouth muscles to simultaneously process and reproduce real speech patterns. Research shows it significantly improves pronunciation accuracy, intonation, rhythm, connected speech, listening comprehension, and speaking fluency — making it one of the most effective methods for IELTS Speaking preparation and real-world English communication.