The recent discoveries of a International Energy Administration whistleblower that the IEA may have distorted crucial oil projections under extreme U.S. pressure is, if real (and whistleblowers hardly ever come forward to advance their careers), a slow-burning atomic explosion on future global oil production. The Bush administration's actions in pushing the IEA to underplay the rate of decrease from existing oil fields while overplaying the opportunities of finding new reserves have the potential to throw governments' long-lasting planning into turmoil.

Whatever the reality, rising long term international needs appear specific to overtake production in the next years, especially provided the high and increasing expenses of developing new super-fields such as Kazakhstan's overseas Kashagan and Brazil's southern Atlantic Jupiter and Carioca fields, which will require billions in investments before their first barrels of oil are produced.

In such a circumstance, additives and substitutes such as biofuels will play an ever-increasing function by extending beleaguered production quotas. As market forces and rising prices drive this innovation to the forefront, one of the richest prospective production locations has actually been absolutely overlooked by financiers up to now - Central Asia. Formerly the USSR's cotton "plantation," the area is poised to end up being a significant player in the production of biofuels if sufficient foreign financial investment can be obtained. Unlike Brazil, where biofuel is produced mostly from sugarcane, or the United States, where it is mostly distilled from corn, Central Asia's ace resource is a native plant, Camelina sativa.

Of the previous Soviet Caucasian and Central Asian republics, those clustered around the coasts of the Caspian, Azerbaijan and Kazakhstan have actually seen their economies boom due to the fact that of record-high energy prices, while Turkmenistan is waiting in the wings as a rising producer of natural gas.

Farther to the east, in Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan, geographical seclusion and relatively scant hydrocarbon resources relative to their Western Caspian next-door neighbors have actually mainly inhibited their capability to capitalize increasing international energy demands up to now. Mountainous Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan stay mostly dependent for their electrical requirements on their Soviet-era hydroelectric facilities, however their increased need to produce winter season electrical power has caused autumnal and winter season water discharges, in turn significantly impacting the agriculture of their western downstream neighbors Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan and Turkmenistan.

What these three downstream countries do have nevertheless is a Soviet-era tradition of agricultural production, which in Uzbekistan's and Turkmenistan case was mostly directed towards cotton production, while Kazakhstan, beginning in the 1950s with Khrushchev's "Virgin Lands" programs, has become a major manufacturer of wheat. Based on my conversations with Central Asian federal government officials, offered the thirsty needs of cotton monoculture, foreign proposals to diversify agrarian production towards biofuel would have great appeal in Astana, Ashgabat and Tashkent and to a lesser degree Astana for those hardy financiers going to bet on the future, specifically as a plant indigenous to the area has actually currently proven itself in trials.

Known in the West as incorrect flax, wild flax, linseed dodder, German sesame and Siberian oilseed, camelina is bring in increased clinical interest for its oleaginous qualities, with several European and American companies currently investigating how to produce it in commercial quantities for biofuel. In January Japan Airlines carried out a historic test flight utilizing camelina-based bio-jet fuel, becoming the very first Asian carrier to experiment with flying on fuel obtained from sustainable feedstocks during a one-hour presentation flight from Tokyo's Haneda Airport. The test was the culmination of a 12 of camelina's functional performance capability and possible industrial viability.

As an alternative energy source, camelina has much to recommend it. It has a high oil material low in saturated fat. In contrast to Central Asia's thirsty "king cotton," camelina is drought-resistant and unsusceptible to spring freezing, needs less fertilizer and herbicides, and can be used as a rotation crop with wheat, which would make it of specific interest in Kazakhstan, now Central Asia's significant wheat exporter. Another perk of camelina is its tolerance of poorer, less fertile conditions. An acre planted with camelina can produce up to 100 gallons of oil and when planted in rotation with wheat, camelina can increase wheat production by 15 percent. A lot (1000 kg) of camelina will contain 350 kg of oil, of which pressing can extract 250 kg. Nothing in camelina production is squandered as after processing, the plant's debris can be used for animals silage. Camelina silage has a particularly appealing concentration of omega-3 fats that make it an especially great livestock feed prospect that is simply now acquiring acknowledgment in the U.S. and Canada. Camelina is fast growing, produces its own natural herbicide (allelopathy) and completes well versus weeds when an even crop is established. According to Britain's Bangor University's Centre for Alternative Land Use, "Camelina could be an ideal low-input crop appropriate for bio-diesel production, due to its lower requirements for nitrogen fertilizer than oilseed rape."

Camelina, a branch of the mustard household, is native to both Europe and Central Asia and barely a brand-new crop on the scene: historical evidence shows it has actually been cultivated in Europe for a minimum of three millennia to produce both grease and animal fodder.

Field trials of production in Montana, currently the center of U.S. camelina research, showed a vast array of results of 330-1,700 lbs of seed per acre, with oil content varying between 29 and 40%. Optimal seeding rates have actually been determined to be in the 6-8 pound per acre range, as the seeds' small size of 400,000 seeds per pound can produce issues in germination to achieve an ideal plant density of around 9 plants per sq. ft.

Camelina's potential might enable Uzbekistan to start breaking out of its most dolorous tradition, the imposition of a cotton monoculture that has warped the country's efforts at agrarian reform since accomplishing self-reliance in 1991. Beginning in the late 19th century, the Russian government determined that Central Asia would become its cotton plantation to feed Moscow's growing fabric market. The process was accelerated under the Soviets. While Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Tajikistan and Turkmenistan were likewise ordered by Moscow to plant cotton, Uzbekistan in specific was singled out to produce "white gold."

By the end of the 1930s the Soviet Union had actually ended up being self-dependent in cotton; five decades later on it had actually ended up being a major exporter of cotton, producing more than one-fifth of the world's production, concentrated in Uzbekistan, which produced 70 percent of the Soviet Union's output.

Try as it might to diversify, in the lack of alternatives Tashkent remains wedded to cotton, producing about 3.6 million heaps every year, which generates more than $1 billion while making up approximately 60 percent of the country's tough currency income.

Beginning in the mid-1960s the Soviet government's regulations for Central Asian cotton production mostly bankrupted the area's scarcest resource, water. Cotton utilizes about 3.5 acre feet of water per acre of plants, leading Soviet coordinators to divert ever-increasing volumes of water from the area's two main rivers, the Amu Darya and Syr Darya, into ineffective watering canals, leading to the remarkable shrinkage of the rivers' last destination, the Aral Sea. The Aral, once the world's fourth-largest inland sea with an area of 26,000 square miles, has diminished to one-quarter its original size in among the 20th century's worst ecological disasters.

And now, the dollars and cents. Dr. Bill Schillinger at Washington State University recently described camelina's service model to Capital Press as: "At 1,400 pounds per acre at 16 cents a pound, camelina would generate $224 per acre; 28-bushel white wheat at $8.23 per bushel would amass $230."

Central Asia has the land, the farms, the watering facilities and a modest wage scale in comparison to America or Europe - all that's missing is the foreign financial investment. U.S. investors have the money and access to the competence of America's land grant universities. What is certain is that biofuel's market share will grow in time; less specific is who will enjoy the benefits of developing it as a practical issue in Central Asia.

If the current past is anything to go by it is not likely to be American and European financiers, fixated as they are on Caspian oil and gas.

But while the Japanese flight experiments suggest Asian interest, American investors have the academic proficiency, if they are prepared to follow the Silk Road into establishing a brand-new market. Certainly anything that lessens water usage and pesticides, diversifies crop production and improves the lot of their agrarian population will receive most mindful factor to consider from Central Asia's governments, and farming and veggie oil processing plants are not just more affordable than pipelines, they can be built more quickly.

And jatropha curcas's biofuel potential? Another story for another time.