The recent revelations of a International Energy Administration whistleblower that the IEA may have distorted essential oil projections under extreme U.S. pressure is, if real (and whistleblowers hardly ever step forward to advance their professions), a slow-burning thermonuclear surge on future global oil production. The Bush administration's actions in pressing the IEA to underplay the rate of decrease from existing oil fields while overplaying the possibilities of finding new reserves have the possible to toss governments' long-lasting preparation into turmoil.

Whatever the truth, rising long term global needs appear particular to overtake production in the next years, especially offered the high and rising costs 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 financial investments before their very first barrels of oil are produced.

In such a scenario, additives and substitutes such as biofuels will play an ever-increasing function by extending beleaguered production quotas. As market forces and increasing prices drive this innovation to the forefront, one of the richest prospective production locations has actually been absolutely ignored by investors already - Central Asia. Formerly the USSR's cotton "plantation," the area is poised to end up being a major gamer in the production of biofuels if enough foreign investment can be acquired. 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 an indigenous plant, Camelina sativa.

Of the former Soviet Caucasian and Central Asian republics, those clustered around the coasts of the Caspian, Azerbaijan and Kazakhstan have seen their economies boom due to the fact that of record-high energy rates, 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 fairly scant hydrocarbon resources relative to their Western Caspian next-door neighbors have mainly hindered their ability to capitalize rising global energy demands already. Mountainous Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan remain largely dependent for their electrical requirements on their Soviet-era hydroelectric facilities, but their increased requirement to create winter season electrical energy has caused autumnal and winter season water discharges, in turn significantly impacting the farming of their western downstream next-door neighbors Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan and Turkmenistan.

What these 3 downstream nations do have however is a Soviet-era legacy of agricultural production, which in Uzbekistan's and Turkmenistan case was mostly directed towards cotton production, while Kazakhstan, starting in the 1950s with Khrushchev's "Virgin Lands" programs, has actually become a significant manufacturer of wheat. Based upon my conversations with Central Asian federal government officials, given the thirsty needs of cotton monoculture, foreign propositions to diversify agrarian production towards biofuel would have terrific appeal in Astana, Ashgabat and Tashkent and to a lower level Astana for those hardy financiers going to bank on the future, specifically as a plant indigenous to the region has currently proven itself in trials.

Known in the West as false flax, wild flax, linseed dodder, German sesame and Siberian oilseed, camelina is bring in increased scientific interest for its oleaginous qualities, with a number of European and American companies currently investigating how to produce it in business quantities for biofuel. In January Japan Airlines undertook a historic test flight using camelina-based bio-jet fuel, ending up being the first Asian carrier to explore flying on fuel stemmed from sustainable feedstocks during a one-hour presentation flight from Tokyo's Haneda Airport. The test was the conclusion of a 12-month assessment of camelina's operational efficiency capability and prospective industrial practicality.

As an alternative energy source, camelina has much to recommend 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, requires 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 reward 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 include 350 kg of oil, of which pushing 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 an especially attractive concentration of omega-3 fats that make it an especially fine livestock feed prospect that is simply now gaining recognition in the U.S. and Canada. Camelina is quick 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 might be an ideal 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 family, is indigenous to both Europe and Central Asia and hardly a brand-new crop on the scene: historical evidence indicates it has 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 vast array of results of 330-1,700 pounds of seed per acre, with oil material varying between 29 and 40%. Optimal seeding rates have actually been determined to be in the 6-8 lb per acre variety, as the seeds' small size of 400,000 seeds per pound can create issues in germination to accomplish an optimum plant density of around 9 plants per sq. ft.

Camelina's capacity might enable Uzbekistan to start breaking out of its most dolorous tradition, the imposition of a cotton monoculture that has distorted the nation's efforts at agrarian reform considering that achieving independence in 1991. Beginning in the late 19th century, the Russian government identified that Central Asia would become its cotton plantation to feed Moscow's growing fabric industry. The procedure was sped up under the Soviets. While Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Tajikistan and Turkmenistan were likewise ordered by Moscow to plant cotton, Uzbekistan in particular was singled out to produce "white gold."

By the end of the 1930s the Soviet Union had become self-sufficient in cotton; 5 years later on it had actually 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 lack of alternatives Tashkent stays wedded to cotton, producing about 3.6 million lots each year, which generates more than $1 billion while constituting around 60 percent of the nation's tough currency income.

Beginning in the mid-1960s the Soviet government's directives 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 organizers to divert ever-increasing volumes of water from the region's two primary rivers, the Amu Darya and Syr Darya, into ineffective watering canals, resulting in the dramatic shrinking of the rivers' last location, the Aral Sea. The Aral, once the world's fourth-largest inland sea with a location of 26,000 square miles, has diminished to one-quarter its original size in one of the 20th century's worst ecological catastrophes.

And now, the dollars and cents. Dr. Bill Schillinger at Washington State University recently explained camelina's organization model 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 garner $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 out on is the foreign financial investment. U.S. financiers have the money and access to the competence of America's land grant universities. What is particular is that biofuel's market share will grow with time; less particular is who will profit of establishing it as a viable concern in Central Asia.

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

But while the Japanese flight experiments show Asian interest, American investors have the scholastic knowledge, if they want to follow the Silk Road into establishing a new market. Certainly anything that reduces water use and pesticides, diversifies crop production and enhances the lot of their agrarian population will get 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 developed faster.

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