Question

As Alex works on the body of her speech on agricultural pollutants and their effects on global warming, she continues to gather evidence and organize it into a logical structure to support her main claim. Which one of the following pieces of evidence would best fit into a section of her speech highlighting specific corporations and the contribution they are making to overall pollution levels.

a definition of "toxic sludge," along with a statement detailing which corporations produce the greatest amounts of sludge

the exact dollar amount spent annually by all U.S. agricultural corporations on the cleanup of environmental pollutants

the exact number of agricultural corporations in the U.S. which produce measurable carbon dioxide and methane emissions

a statistic stating the annual carbon dioxide and methane emissions of each of the "Big Three" agricultural corporations in the U.S.

Answer 1

The piece of evidence that would best fit into a section of her speech highlighting specific corporations and their contribution to overall pollution levels would be:

"a statistic stating the annual carbon dioxide and methane emissions of each of the 'Big Three' agricultural corporations in the U.S."

This option provides specific data about specific corporations, which is directly relevant to the section of the speech. The other options either provide general information (such as the total amount spent on cleanup, or the number of corporations that produce emissions), or focus on a different type of pollution (toxic sludge) which may not be directly related to global warming. The named corporations and their specific emissions data will offer a concrete example of the contribution of agricultural corporations to global warming.