Band 5.5 IELTS Writing Task 2 Model Answer
Overall Band Score: 5.5 · Cambridge IELTS 20 · 2026-09-25
IELTS Writing Task 2 question
Some people have decided to reduce the number of times they fly every year or to stop flying altogether.
Do you think the environmental benefits of this development outweigh the disadvantages for individuals and businesses?
Give reasons for your answer and include any relevant examples from your own knowledge or experience.
Student answer (Band 5.5)
Air travel is one of the most carbon-intensive form of transportation, causing a wide-spread carbon emission in the natural environment, which directly and indirectly accelerates the effects of global warming. Travelling less by air can promote less personal carbon footprint, leading to low emission of harmful substances in the air. Individuals must consider this as a concerning factor and reinforce the government sectors to introduce new and improved technologies that are environmental friendly and are proven by health perspective. Additionally, decresing air travel will push the government and aviation companies to launch better alternatives like electric vehicles, high-speed rails, and good aviation fuel, which is environmental-friendly and provides long-term sustainable transport infrastructure.
Although the air travel is significant for fast tourists especially for those who fly overseas, for the purpose of business meeting or an international job. If they are no longer facilitated with this particular travelling service, their business or work with be affected.
Undoubtedly, this is a huge investment and governments require billions of dollars to shift this infrastructure into a more conventional and eco-friendly one.
I personally believe that the advantages regarding diminishing the old air travel that harms the environment are generally more as the installation of green technologies with benefit the society in terms of its safety and sustainability.
AI examiner evaluation
| Criterion | Band |
|---|---|
| Task Achievement / Task Response | 5.0 |
| Coherence and Cohesion | 5.5 |
| Lexical Resource | 6.0 |
| Grammatical Range and Accuracy | 5.0 |
| Overall | 5.5 |
Task Achievement / Task Response: Band 5.0
The student addresses both sides of the prompt—the environmental benefits of reducing air travel and the disadvantages for individuals and businesses—thus addressing all parts of the task. However, the position is slightly hindered by under-developed arguments and brief treatment of the disadvantages. Furthermore, the response is significantly under-length, containing only 214 words against the mandatory 250-word minimum. This negative constraint violation severely limits the depth of ideational development and prevents the response from reaching higher band scores. Consequently, Task Achievement is penalised for failing to meet the minimum word count requirement.
Coherence and Cohesion: Band 5.5
The text demonstrates a basic attempt at logical organisation, but the overall progression is disrupted by poor paragraphing and abrupt transitions. For instance, the second and third body paragraphs are exceptionally short and disjointed, appearing more like isolated sentences than fully realised paragraphs. While some cohesive devices are employed, such as 'Additionally' and 'Although', referencing is occasionally unclear, and the mechanical structuring of paragraphs prevents a smooth flow of ideas throughout the essay.
Lexical Resource: Band 6.0
The student demonstrates an adequate range of vocabulary for the task, attempting some less common lexical items such as 'carbon-intensive', 'sustainable transport infrastructure', and 'conventional'. However, there are noticeable word-choice and collocation inaccuracies, such as 'form of transportation' (instead of forms), 'wide-spread carbon emission', 'environmental friendly' (instead of environmentally friendly), and 'decresing'. These lexical errors and spelling mistakes do not heavily impede communication, but they restrict the lexical score to a Band 6.0.
Grammatical Range and Accuracy: Band 5.0
The writer employs a mix of simple and complex sentence structures, attempting conditional and relative clauses. However, grammatical accuracy is inconsistent. There are several noticeable errors, such as subject-verb agreement issues ('the air travel is significant', 'technologies with benefit'), incorrect prepositions ('from health perspective'), and fragment sentences. For example, the sentence starting with 'Although the air travel is significant...' is a dependent clause left without an independent main clause to complete the thought. These errors occasionally cause difficulty for the reader.
See this exact question answered at other band scores. The same prompt compared across bands.
Browse more IELTS Writing model answers or get your own writing scored by the same AI examiner.