Using Alaska oil would lower cost, end dependency

To the editor:

This nation purchases $88 billion of crude oil from Arabia for a total of 16 percent of our gross domestic consumption. With the projected oil production of northern Alaska at 20 percent, we could tell Arabia to keep its oil and watch the price per barrel drop.

The environmentalists demand that we drive 30-mile-per-gallon, 30-horsepower vehicles. They say this will reduce the gross domestic fuel consumption, and it will. Is there another country that drives 30-mile-per-gallon, 30-horsepower vehicles? That would be England. What are the English paying for gasoline? What are we paying for gasoline? Does this mean the less gasoline consumption the higher the price of gas?

RICHARD KLINE

Gipsy, Mo.