Band 6.5 IELTS Writing Task 2 Model Answer

Overall Band Score: 6.5 · Cambridge IELTS 20 · 2026-10-05

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 6.5)

In many parts of the world, people have begun to reduce the number of flights they take yearly or have even stopped flying at all. In my opinion, there are more advantages than disadvanteges to minimize air travel because it significantly reduces carbon emissions and environmental pollution. However, this could also have drawbacks for professionals who travel regulary such as government officials and enterprenuers.

One major advantage of decreasing flights is that it contributes significantly to the reduction of carbon emission. Every flight requires liters of fuel, which produces highly toxic gases that in turn pollute the natual environment and disrupt the ozone layer. If everyone starts to avoid flying by air, after a period of time, people would notice cleaner air, and less lung infections. Additionally, fuel consumption would decrease exponentially which will give an opportunity to the airline companies to utilize it efficiently by creating energy reserves for the future.

Despite these benefits, reducing air travel can be time-consuming and extremely risky for businesses. Government officials such as President or Prime ministers have a dire need to use private jets in order to attend emergency meetings with other nations' political leaders which would otherwise take days to reach by road. Similarly, avoiding air travel can also delay the critical business meetings which can result in ending a potential collaboration or partnership between mutlinational companies. However, if planned in adavance these situations can be avoided that will help not only the companies but also the climate.

In conclusion, while travelling by road can be time comsuming and can risks emergency meetings, the adavantges of not flying outweight the disadvantages as it helps to keep the environment cleaner and saves energy resources.

AI examiner evaluation

Task Achievement / Task Response: Band 6.5

The response successfully addresses all parts of the prompt by presenting a clear position on whether the environmental benefits of reducing air travel outweigh the disadvantages. The student covers both sides of the argument, examining the positive impacts on carbon emissions and the negative consequences for business and government travel. While the arguments are generally relevant and clear, some ideas lean towards over-generalisation and could benefit from deeper extension. For instance, the claim that avoiding flying would directly result in fewer lung infections lacks sufficient elaboration to fully support the argument. To move towards higher bands, the writer needs to provide more fully developed, detailed explanations and specific examples to substantiate every main point presented.

Coherence and Cohesion: Band 7.0

The essay displays a clear logical organisation and progression throughout. Each paragraph has a distinct focus, beginning with an introduction that outlines the writer's stance, followed by body paragraphs dedicated to the environmental advantages and the business disadvantages respectively, and concluding with a summary. Cohesive devices such as 'One major advantage', 'Additionally', 'Despite these benefits', and 'In conclusion' are used effectively to guide the reader through the argument, showing a flexible approach to text structuring. Paragraphing is used appropriately to separate ideas. To achieve an even higher level, referencing could be managed with greater subtlety and paragraph transitions made slightly more seamless.

Lexical Resource: Band 6.0

The vocabulary used provides a sufficient range for the task, allowing the writer to discuss environmental and business issues with some precision. There are successful attempts to use less common items and topic-specific vocabulary, such as 'carbon emissions', 'ozone layer', 'fuel consumption', and 'multinational companies'. However, the response contains several spelling and word-choice errors, including 'disadvanteges', 'regulary', 'enterprenuers', 'natual', 'mutlinational', 'adavance', 'comsuming', and 'adavantges'. These errors do not impede communication, but they prevent the piece from achieving a higher lexical score. To improve, the writer should focus on expanding spelling accuracy and refining word choices to ensure greater precision.

Grammatical Range and Accuracy: Band 6.5

The essay demonstrates a reasonable mix of simple and complex sentence forms, incorporating conditional structures and relative clauses such as 'If everyone starts to avoid flying by air...'. There is good control over basic structures, and punctuation is generally handled well. However, some grammatical errors and awkward phrasing persist, such as 'have even stopped flying at all' instead of 'altogether', 'to minimize air travel' following 'advantages than disadvantages', and minor preposition or article slips like 'by air'. These errors occur within a mix of sentence types and rarely impede communication, reflecting solid control while leaving room for a higher frequency of error-free complex sentences.

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