The recent revelations of a International Energy Administration whistleblower that the IEA may have misshaped crucial oil forecasts under extreme U.S. pressure is, if real (and whistleblowers hardly ever come forward to advance their careers), a slow-burning atomic surge on future worldwide oil production. The Bush administration's actions in pressuring the IEA to underplay the rate of decline from existing oil fields while overplaying the opportunities of finding brand-new reserves have the possible to toss federal governments' long-lasting preparation into mayhem.

Whatever the truth, increasing long term global needs appear specific to overtake production in the next years, specifically offered the high and rising costs of establishing brand-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 replacements such as biofuels will play an ever-increasing function by extending beleaguered production quotas. As market forces and rising rates drive this technology to the leading edge, one of the richest prospective production locations has actually been completely neglected by investors up to now - Central Asia. Formerly the USSR's cotton "plantation," the area is poised to end up being a significant gamer in the production of biofuels if enough foreign financial investment can be obtained. Unlike Brazil, where biofuel is produced mainly from sugarcane, or the United States, where it is primarily distilled from corn, Central Asia's ace resource is a native plant, Camelina sativa.

Of the former Soviet Caucasian and Central Asian republics, those clustered around the shores of the Caspian, Azerbaijan and Kazakhstan have actually seen their economies boom because of record-high energy prices, while Turkmenistan is waiting in the wings as a rising producer of gas.

Farther to the east, in Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan, geographical isolation and reasonably scant hydrocarbon resources relative to their Western Caspian neighbors have actually mainly hindered their ability to money in on increasing worldwide energy needs already. Mountainous Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan remain mainly reliant for their electrical requirements on their Soviet-era hydroelectric facilities, but their heightened requirement to generate winter electricity has actually led to autumnal and winter season water discharges, in turn seriously impacting the agriculture of their western downstream neighbors Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan and Turkmenistan.

What these three downstream countries do have nevertheless is a Soviet-era legacy of agricultural production, which in Uzbekistan's and Turkmenistan case was mainly directed towards cotton production, while Kazakhstan, beginning in the 1950s with Khrushchev's "Virgin Lands" programs, has ended up being a significant manufacturer of wheat. Based on my discussions with Central Asian government officials, offered the thirsty needs of cotton monoculture, foreign propositions to diversify agrarian production towards biofuel would have fantastic appeal in Astana, Ashgabat and Tashkent and to a lesser extent Astana for those hardy financiers happy to wager on the future, especially as a plant native to the region has already shown itself in trials.

Known in the West as false 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 business already examining how to produce it in industrial quantities for biofuel. In January Japan Airlines undertook a historical test flight utilizing camelina-based bio-jet fuel, ending up being the first Asian carrier to explore flying on fuel originated from sustainable feedstocks during a one-hour demonstration flight from Tokyo's Haneda Airport. The test was the culmination of a 12-month assessment of camelina's functional efficiency ability and potential business practicality.

As an alternative energy source, camelina has much to advise 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 utilized 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 approximately 100 gallons of oil and when planted in rotation with wheat, camelina can increase wheat production by 15 percent. A load (1000 kg) of camelina will contain 350 kg of oil, of which pushing can draw out 250 kg. Nothing in camelina production is wasted as after processing, the plant's debris can be used for livestock silage. Camelina silage has an especially appealing concentration of omega-3 fatty acids that make it a particularly great animals feed candidate that is recently gaining acknowledgment in the U.S. and Canada. Camelina is fast growing, produces its own natural herbicide (allelopathy) and competes well against weeds when an even crop is established. According to Britain's Bangor University's Centre for Alternative Land Use, "Camelina might be a perfect low-input crop ideal for bio-diesel production, due to its lower requirements for nitrogen fertilizer than oilseed rape."

Camelina, a branch of the mustard household, is indigenous to both Europe and Central Asia and hardly a new crop on the scene: historical proof indicates it has actually been cultivated in Europe for a minimum of 3 millennia to produce both grease and animal fodder.

Field trials of production in Montana, presently the center of U.S. camelina research, showed a large range of results of 330-1,700 pounds of seed per acre, with oil content varying between 29 and 40%. Optimal seeding rates have been figured out to be in the 6-8 pound per acre range, as the seeds' small size of 400,000 seeds per lb can create issues in germination to accomplish an optimum plant density of around 9 plants per sq. ft.

Camelina's capacity could permit Uzbekistan to begin breaking out of its most dolorous legacy, the imposition of a cotton monoculture that has deformed the nation's efforts at agrarian reform given that accomplishing self-reliance in 1991. Beginning in the late 19th century, the Russian federal government figured out that Central Asia would become its cotton plantation to feed Moscow's growing fabric market. The procedure was accelerated under the Soviets. While Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Tajikistan and Turkmenistan were likewise ordered by Moscow to sow cotton, Uzbekistan in specific was singled out to produce "white gold."

By the end of the 1930s the Soviet Union had actually become self-sufficient in cotton; 5 years later on it had become a significant exporter of cotton, producing more than one-fifth of the world's production, focused in Uzbekistan, which produced 70 percent of the Soviet Union's output.

Try as it may to diversify, in the absence of alternatives Tashkent remains wedded to cotton, producing about 3.6 million loads yearly, which brings in more than $1 billion while constituting approximately 60 percent of the country's tough currency earnings.

Beginning in the mid-1960s the Soviet federal government's directives for Central Asian cotton production mainly bankrupted the region's scarcest resource, water. Cotton uses about 3.5 acre feet of water per acre of plants, leading Soviet planners to divert ever-increasing volumes of water from the area's 2 primary rivers, the Amu Darya and Syr Darya, into ineffective irrigation canals, leading to the remarkable shrinkage of the rivers' final location, the Aral Sea. The Aral, when the world's fourth-largest inland sea with a location of 26,000 square miles, has diminished to one-quarter its initial size in among the 20th century's worst ecological catastrophes.

And now, the dollars and cents. Dr. Bill Schillinger at Washington State University just recently described camelina's company design to Capital Press as: "At 1,400 pounds per acre at 16 cents a pound, camelina would bring in $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 contrast to America or Europe - all that's missing is the foreign financial investment. U.S. financiers have the cash and access to the expertise of America's land grant universities. What is specific is that biofuel's market share will grow in time; less specific is who will gain the benefits of developing it as a feasible concern in Central Asia.

If the current past is anything to go by it is unlikely to be American and European financiers, fixated as they are on Caspian oil and gas.

But while the Japanese flight experiments indicate Asian interest, American investors have the scholastic knowledge, if they are ready to follow the Silk Road into developing a brand-new market. Certainly anything that minimizes water usage and pesticides, diversifies crop production and improves the lot of their agrarian population will get most mindful factor to consider from Central Asia's governments, and farming and grease processing plants are not just more affordable than pipelines, they can be constructed quicker.

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