To The Editor: Bearing in mind today’s energy crisis in America, I enclosed a copy of a letter to the editor written some 35 years ago in the Morristown Daily Record in 1973. I am a retired engineer living in Cape May County. The energy crisis has bearing on all America, whether it be national, regional or local of course. The cost of a barrel of oil has skyrocketed to $135 recently. The cost in 2001 was $29.65, a 400 percent increase. The experts indicate the price can and will increase to $200 a barrel. This will not only hinder but possibly destroy the airline and trucking industries to say nothing of their related industries. Without transportation, food supplies can and will be jeopardized around the world. Complacency among the American people is no longer an option. If countries such as France and Brazil are totally independent of imported oil, where have we been for the past 35 years? France’s energy or 80 percent of their energy is supplied via nuclear power. Brazil has multi sources and is self-sufficient. My point is, we need answers and we need them now. We don’t have another 35 years to procrastinate. W. J. MURPHY Cape May (ED NOTE: The writer enclosed a copy of a letter to the editor that he wrote on the same subject in 1973 outlining the necessity for a new energy policy.)