Day reading Passage (Australian culture and culture shock)

19 
To couple with (phr verb) 
- to consider one thing along with or in addition to 
something else.
Example: An oil spill coupled with strong winds brought disaster.
20 
To cancel out smth (phr verb) 
- to take away the effect of one thing by doing 
another thing that has the opposite effect:
Example: You can’t be creative and critical at the same time - one cancels out the
other.

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Day 24
You should spend about 20 minutes on Questions 27-40, which are based on Reading
Passage 3 below.
How Green is your PlanIT Valley?
The first thing to say about the people running new European company Living PlanIT 
is that they are ambitious. Not only are they planning to build a smart green city from 
scratch at a site in northern Portugal, but they also hope to establish their PlanIT Valley 
development as both a genuine European alternative to the USA’s Silicon Valley, and 
a working model that will inspire the next generation of low carbon cities. These will 
combine real environmental sustainability with a quality of IT-enhanced urban living almost 
unrecognisable from the crowded, polluted and disorganised reality that is city life for most 
people.
Many are sceptical about the company’s plans for a brand-new smart city packed 
with cutting-edge green technology which can house 225,000 people while producing 
‘negligible’ greenhouse gas emissions. To them, the technical challenges, combined with 
the $10 billion that the company needs to raise to see the project through from beginning 
to end, make Living PlanlT’s plans sound more like an admirable experiment rather than 
a viable construction project. Their scepticism is not helped by the company’s use of 
marketing language that, in order to understand it, requires a degree in Public Relations. 
For example, the company’s claim that its design and manufacturing platforms enable the 
convergence of computing, network and sensing technologies with the fabric of buildings 
and places, demonstrated at urban scale in the development and operations of PlanIT 
Valley’ does not really explain what it does.
However, when you listen to chief executive Steve Lewis outline his plans for the 
company, it becomes possible to believe that they might just deliver on their absurdly 
ambitious promises. His rationale for the company is admirably simple. He argues that 
the construction industry remains the last sector of the economy to resist the IT revolution 
that has enhanced efficiencies across every other industry, from car manufacturing to food 
production. Their existing techniques are inadequate, he says, for today’s technology-rich 
and environmentally-aware requirements. Here, therefore, is an opportunity to entirely 
update the building process. Taking lessons from other manufacturing industries, including 
aerospace, automotive and shipbuilding, project leaders identified a number of elements 
that feature in modern manufacturing processes and which could be applied to modern 
buildings from the very start of the construction process.
Living PlanIT plans to integrate IT into the fabric of the city. It is installing many thousands 
of sensors that allow an urban operating system to deliver intelligent buildings that are 
constantly optimised to enhance comfort, productivity and environmental sustainability. 
Meanwhile, the latest renewable energy technologies and green building techniques will 
allow the city to operate with a virtually non-existent carbon footprint. Of course, such

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Reading Passage 3
techniques are not new, but they are rarely put into practice. In fact, the IT industry has 
been complaining for a long time that the construction sector has failed to make adequate 
(if any) use of IT in its buildings.
So, what makes PlanIT Valley different? For a start, the company has considerable power 
and influence, both in terms of the team it has assembled and the financial backing it has 
already been promised. Lewis and many on the senior management team have served as 
senior executives with other major IT companies. This means that they not only have the 
right experience, but also the essential anything is possible’ mentality that is a feature of 
such companies. In addition, Lewis claims that the company has already invested $300 
million in putting together its team of engineers and developing its technology portfolio.
As a result, the project is establishing a degree of credibility that far exceeds that of other 
similar projects.
More importantly, however, almost all of the technology the company is planning to deploy 
in PlanIT Valley either already exists or is viable from a technical point of view. Intelligent 
buildings that know to turn the air-conditioning on before you even realise you are hot 
may sound like something out of a science-fiction novel, but we are increasingly living in 
a science-fiction age. You do not need to invent anything new to develop a zero-carbon 
smart city, you just have to put all the right technologies together in the right place.
If Living PlanIT achieve this integration, it will hopefully be able to prove the final part of 
Lewis’ claim. Namely, that cost concerns surrounding green developments are ill-founded. 
A more automated approach to construction coupled with long-term efficiency gains 
delivered by intelligent infrastructure more than cancel out the extra money required to 
build the development in the first place. And if it can win the economic argument, future 
opportunities are enormous. As Lewis points out, projected world population growth means 
that the world has to deliver between 9,500 and 10,000 new cities over the next forty years 
to house everyone. There is no chance of avoiding dangerous levels of climate change 
unless this expansion is delivered in an environmentally-sustainable manner. That would 
provide quite a business opportunity for the company that can deliver the solution.
The PlanIT Valley project presents many problems in terms of project management and 
coordination, and there is a huge amount of work to be done before the first residents 
are able to move in. Whatever the outcome, it is hard not to admire a project that will 
put so many theories about smart cities to the test all in one go. First, it is challenging 
accepted assumptions on how cities should be designed and constructed. Secondly, it will 
show what can be done if connectivity and intelligence are built into the design from the 
beginning. Thirdly, it will be a pilot project for a whole range of new services and, equally 
important, new types of collaboration.

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Day 24
Write the correct letter in boxes 27-31 on your answer sheet.
27 
What do we learn about the people running the company Living PlanIT in the first 
paragraph?
A
They are going to build the world’s first green smart city.
В 
They want to build a replica of Silicon Valley in Europe.
С 
They want their new city to be the first of other similar cities.
D 
They think that the quality of life in most other cities is unacceptable.
28 
Why are a lot of people sceptical about PlanIT Valley?
A
They do not think that the plans are practical or possible.
В 
They do not understand how the technology works.
С 
They have misunderstood the reasons why Living PlanIT is building a new city.
D 
They have not read the marketing information clearly enough.
29 
Who or what does 
Their
in 
Their existing techniques
refer to in the 3rd paragraph?
A
Living PlanIT
В 
The construction industry
С 
Car manufacturers
D 
Food producers
30 
The senior management team at Living PlanIT
A
have more power and influence than teams working on other, similar projects.
В 
have raised enough money to build PlanIT Valley.
С 
work elsewhere when they are not working on the PlanIT Valley project.
D 
possess the right attitude required to undertake such a major project.
31 
Why, according to the author, is the PlanIT Valley project so admirable?
A
It shows how good working practices can have a successful outcome.
В 
It presents such a challenge to its creators.
С 
It is putting several theories into practice simultaneously.
D 
It demonstrates why collaboration between builders and IT experts is so 
important.
Questions 27-31
Choose the correct letter, А, В, С or D.

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In boxes 32-36 on your answer sheet, write