The current discoveries of a International Energy Administration whistleblower that the IEA may have distorted key oil projections under extreme U.S. pressure is, if true (and whistleblowers rarely come forward to advance their careers), a slow-burning atomic explosion on future global oil production. The Bush administration's actions in pressuring the IEA to underplay the rate of decline from existing oil fields while overplaying the possibilities of finding new reserves have the potential to throw federal governments' long-lasting preparation into chaos.

Whatever the reality, rising long term global demands seem certain to outstrip production in the next years, specifically provided the high and increasing expenses of developing new super-fields such as Kazakhstan's offshore Kashagan and Brazil's southern Atlantic Jupiter and Carioca fields, which will need billions in investments before their very first barrels of oil are produced.

In such a circumstance, ingredients and substitutes such as biofuels will play an ever-increasing function by extending beleaguered production quotas. As market forces and increasing costs drive this technology to the forefront, among the wealthiest potential production locations has actually been completely neglected by financiers already - Central Asia. Formerly the USSR's cotton "plantation," the region is poised to end up being a major gamer in the production of biofuels if sufficient foreign investment can be procured. Unlike Brazil, where biofuel is made mainly from sugarcane, or the United States, where it is mostly distilled from corn, Central Asia's ace resource is an indigenous plant, Camelina sativa.

Of the previous Soviet Caucasian and Central Asian republics, those clustered around the coasts of the Caspian, Azerbaijan and Kazakhstan have seen their economies boom since 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 fairly scant hydrocarbon resources relative to their Western Caspian next-door neighbors have actually mostly inhibited their ability to cash in on rising worldwide energy needs up to now. Mountainous Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan stay largely dependent for their electrical requirements on their Soviet-era hydroelectric infrastructure, however their heightened requirement to create winter season electrical power has resulted in autumnal and winter water discharges, in turn badly impacting the farming of their western downstream neighbors Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan and Turkmenistan.

What these 3 downstream countries do have however is a Soviet-era tradition 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 ended up being a significant manufacturer of wheat. Based on my conversations with Central Asian federal government authorities, given the thirsty demands of cotton monoculture, foreign proposals to diversify agrarian production towards biofuel would have fantastic appeal in Astana, Ashgabat and Tashkent and to a lower level Astana for those hardy financiers happy to bank on the future, particularly as a plant native to the area has currently shown itself in trials.

Known in the West as false flax, wild flax, linseed dodder, German sesame and Siberian oilseed, camelina is drawing in increased clinical interest for its oleaginous qualities, with a number of European and American companies already examining how to produce it in commercial amounts for biofuel. In January Japan Airlines undertook a historic test flight using camelina-based bio-jet fuel, becoming the first Asian carrier to explore flying on fuel originated from sustainable feedstocks during a one-hour presentation flight from Tokyo's Haneda Airport. The test was the conclusion of a 12-month examination of camelina's operational performance ability and possible commercial 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 fertilizer and herbicides, and can be used as a rotation crop with wheat, which would make it of particular interest in Kazakhstan, now Central Asia's major wheat exporter. Another perk of camelina is its tolerance of poorer, less fertile conditions. An acre sown 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 include 350 kg of oil, of which pushing can draw out 250 kg. Nothing in camelina production is squandered as after processing, the plant's particles can be utilized for livestock silage. Camelina silage has an especially appealing concentration of omega-3 fatty acids that make it a particularly fine livestock feed candidate that is just now acquiring recognition in the U.S. and Canada. Camelina is quick 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 appropriate for bio-diesel production, due to its lower requirements for nitrogen fertilizer than oilseed rape."

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

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

Camelina's capacity might allow Uzbekistan to begin breaking out of its most dolorous tradition, the imposition of a cotton monoculture that has warped the country's efforts at agrarian reform because achieving 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 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; five years later on it had actually 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 might to diversify, in the lack of alternatives Tashkent remains wedded to cotton, producing about 3.6 million lots every year, which generates more than $1 billion while constituting approximately 60 percent of the country's hard cash 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 two primary rivers, the Amu Darya and Syr Darya, into ineffective watering canals, leading to the dramatic shrinkage of the rivers' final destination, the Aral Sea. The Aral, as soon as the world's fourth-largest inland sea with an area of 26,000 square miles, has actually shrunk 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 just recently explained 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 garner $230."

Central Asia has the land, the farms, the irrigation facilities and a modest wage scale in contrast to America or Europe - all that's missing is the foreign investment. U.S. investors have the money and access to the know-how of America's land grant universities. What is specific is that biofuel's market share will grow with time; less certain is who will profit of developing it as a viable concern in Central Asia.

If the current past is anything to pass it is unlikely 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 knowledge, if they are willing to follow the Silk Road into establishing a new market. Certainly anything that lessens water usage and pesticides, diversifies crop production and enhances the great deal of their agrarian population will get most mindful consideration from Central Asia's governments, and farming and grease 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.