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leased; a maximum of between 3,500 to 14,000 barrels of shale oil. However, the probability of rupture is small and the earth surrOUnding the pipeline will oHen provide a high resistance to flow. The Na- tional Petroleum Council has reported that for 1968, 210,000 miles 01 petroleum pipeline in the U.S. transported 6.5 billion barrels of liquid petroleum commodities. Only sbc-thousandth of 1 per cent 01 this was spilled due to pipeline failure and much of this was recovered." FOR THE READERS' benefit " would outline Ihe problems of 100 much depen- dency of foreign oil supplies. (U. S. now imports about 20 per cenl of nation's con- sumption which will increase 10 50 per cent by 1985.) These problems were identified by the Cabinet Task Force as: "1. War might possibly increase our pe- troleum requirements beyond the ability or willingness ofloraign sources to supply us. 2. In a prolonged conventional war, the enemy might sink the tankers needed to import oil or to carry it to market lrom domestic production sources such as Alaska. 3. Local or regional revolution, hostilities, or guerrilla activities might physically interrupt foreign production or transportation. 4. Exporting countries might be taken over by radical govern- ments unwilling to do business with us or our allies. 5. Communist countries might induce exporting countries to deny their oil to the West. 6. A group of exporting countries might act in concert to deny their oil to us, as occurred briefly in the wake of the 1967 Arab-Israeli war. 7. Ex- porting countries might take over the assets 01 American or European compa- nies. 8. Exporting countries might lorm an effective cartel raising oil prices substan- tially." The crux of the argument against im- porting a substantial Iraction 01 the na~ lion's oil is that the source of additional foreign oil. In general, the Middle East or North Africa are "insecure" and might be lempted to withhold exports to the U.S. for pOlitical and/or economic gain; The United Stales has 6 per cent of world's popUlation but consumes some 35 per cent of the world's energy in alt forms and uses about 60 per cent of world's mineral resources! For the world as a whole, the per capita consumption is rising which could result in the U.S. share of world consumption to fall by 10 per cent before the year 2000; however, the total U.S. hunger for energy and min. erals would increase. Historically this increasq has been at the rate of 8 per cent a year although the population of United States is increasing at about 1.2 per cent a year. This shows that the energy and minerals demand correlates closely with gross nahonal product (GNP) which, in turn, correlates with bOth population and per capita in- come. The increasing use is more due to aHluence and a rising material standard of Jiving. N. B. PUNDARl UtlIeton <70J