The current revelations of a International Energy Administration whistleblower that the IEA might have misshaped essential oil forecasts under intense U.S. pressure is, if real (and whistleblowers hardly ever step forward to advance their professions), a slow-burning atomic explosion on future worldwide oil production. The Bush administration's actions in pressing the IEA to underplay the rate of decrease from existing oil fields while overplaying the opportunities of finding new reserves have the prospective to toss governments' long-lasting planning into mayhem.

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

In such a circumstance, additives and replacements such as biofuels will play an ever-increasing role by stretching beleaguered production quotas. As market forces and rising costs drive this innovation to the forefront, one of the wealthiest possible production areas has actually been totally ignored by investors already - Central Asia. Formerly the USSR's cotton "plantation," the region is poised to end up being a significant gamer in the production of biofuels if enough foreign financial investment can be acquired. Unlike Brazil, where biofuel is manufactured largely 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 seen their economies boom because of record-high energy prices, while Turkmenistan is waiting in the wings as a rising manufacturer of gas.

Farther to the east, in Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan, geographical isolation and reasonably little hydrocarbon resources relative to their Western Caspian neighbors have largely hindered their ability to money in on rising international energy needs up to now. Mountainous Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan remain mostly dependent for their electrical requirements on their Soviet-era hydroelectric infrastructure, however their increased need to generate winter season electrical energy has resulted in autumnal and winter season water discharges, in turn significantly affecting the agriculture of their western downstream neighbors Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan and Turkmenistan.

What these 3 downstream nations do have nevertheless is a Soviet-era legacy of agricultural production, which in Uzbekistan's and Turkmenistan case was largely directed towards cotton production, while Kazakhstan, beginning in the 1950s with Khrushchev's "Virgin Lands" programs, has actually become a significant producer of wheat. Based upon my conversations with Central Asian government authorities, 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 lower degree Astana for those durable investors ready to wager on the future, specifically as a plant indigenous to the region has actually 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 numerous European and American companies already examining how to produce it in industrial quantities for biofuel. In January Japan Airlines carried out a historic test flight using camelina-based bio-jet fuel, ending up being the very first Asian provider to explore flying on fuel stemmed from sustainable feedstocks throughout a one-hour presentation flight from Tokyo's Haneda Airport. The test was the culmination of a 12-month assessment of camelina's functional efficiency capability and potential business viability.

As an alternative energy source, camelina has much to suggest it. It has a high oil content low in saturated fat. In contrast to Central Asia's thirsty "king cotton," camelina is drought-resistant and immune to spring freezing, needs less 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 major wheat exporter. Another bonus 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 heap (1000 kg) of camelina will contain 350 kg of oil, of which pressing can draw out 250 kg. Nothing in camelina production is squandered as after processing, the plant's debris can be utilized for animals silage. Camelina silage has an especially appealing concentration of omega-3 fats that make it a particularly great livestock feed candidate that is simply now gaining recognition 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 developed. 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 proof indicates it has actually been cultivated in Europe for at least 3 centuries to produce both veggie oil and animal fodder.

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

Camelina's capacity could permit Uzbekistan to start breaking out of its most dolorous tradition, the imposition of a cotton monoculture that has deformed the nation's attempts at agrarian reform because achieving 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 textile market. The process was accelerated under the Soviets. While Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Tajikistan and Turkmenistan were likewise purchased by Moscow to sow cotton, Uzbekistan in particular 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; 5 years later on it had ended up being a significant 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 may to diversify, in the absence of alternatives Tashkent stays wedded to cotton, producing about 3.6 million tons every year, which generates more than $1 billion while constituting roughly 60 percent of the country's hard cash earnings.

Beginning in the mid-1960s the Soviet government's instructions for Central Asian cotton production largely bankrupted the area's scarcest resource, water. Cotton uses 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 inefficient watering canals, leading to the significant shrinkage of the rivers' last destination, 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 original size in among the 20th century's worst eco-friendly catastrophes.

And now, the dollars and cents. Dr. Bill Schillinger at Washington State University just recently described camelina's business 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 garner $230."

Central Asia has the land, the farms, the watering infrastructure and a modest wage scale in comparison to America or Europe - all that's missing out on is the foreign investment. U.S. investors have the cash and access to the competence of America's land grant universities. What is certain is that biofuel's market share will grow with time; less certain is who will profit of establishing it as a viable concern in Central Asia.

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

But while the Japanese flight experiments show Asian interest, American investors have the academic proficiency, if they are ready to follow the Silk Road into establishing a new market. Certainly anything that reduces water use and pesticides, diversifies crop production and improves the great deal of their agrarian population will get most careful consideration from Central Asia's federal governments, and farming and vegetable oil processing plants are not only more affordable than pipelines, they can be developed quicker.

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