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The current discoveries 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 professions), 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 chances of discovering new reserves have the prospective to throw governments' long-term planning into mayhem.

Whatever the reality, rising long term worldwide needs appear particular to outstrip production in the next years, particularly 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 need billions in financial investments before their first barrels of oil are produced.

In such a circumstance, ingredients and alternatives such as biofuels will play an ever-increasing role by extending beleaguered production quotas. As market forces and increasing costs drive this innovation to the leading edge, among the wealthiest possible 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 adequate foreign financial investment can be acquired. Unlike Brazil, where biofuel is produced largely 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 shores of the Caspian, Azerbaijan and Kazakhstan have actually seen their economies boom because of record-high energy rates, while Turkmenistan is waiting in the wings as a rising manufacturer of natural 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 inhibited their capability to money in on increasing global energy needs up to now. Mountainous Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan remain mainly dependent for their electrical requirements on their Soviet-era hydroelectric infrastructure, but their heightened need to create winter electricity has actually resulted in autumnal and winter 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, starting in the 1950s with Khrushchev's "Virgin Lands" programs, has actually become a major producer of wheat. Based upon my conversations with Central Asian government authorities, provided the thirsty demands of cotton monoculture, foreign propositions to diversify agrarian production towards biofuel would have excellent appeal in Astana, Ashgabat and Tashkent and to a lesser level Astana for those durable financiers happy to bank on the future, especially as a plant indigenous to the region has already 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 numerous European and American business currently examining how to produce it in business quantities for biofuel. In January Japan Airlines undertook a historical test flight utilizing camelina-based bio-jet fuel, becoming the first Asian carrier to experiment with flying on fuel derived from sustainable feedstocks during a one-hour demonstration flight from Tokyo's Haneda Airport. The test was the conclusion of a 12-month evaluation of camelina's operational efficiency capability and potential business viability.

As an alternative energy source, camelina has much to suggest it. It has a high oil material low in hydrogenated 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 major wheat exporter. Another bonus 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 heap (1000 kg) of camelina will consist of 350 kg of oil, of which pushing can extract 250 kg. Nothing in camelina production is wasted as after processing, the plant's particles can be used for animals silage. Camelina silage has an especially appealing concentration of omega-3 fatty acids that make it an especially fine animals feed candidate that is simply now gaining recognition in the U.S. and Canada. Camelina is quick growing, produces its own natural herbicide (allelopathy) and competes 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 suitable 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: archaeological evidence shows it has been cultivated in Europe for a minimum of 3 millennia to produce both veggie oil and animal fodder.

Field trials of production in Montana, currently the center of U.S. camelina research study, showed a large variety of outcomes of 330-1,700 pounds of seed per acre, with oil content differing 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 create problems in germination to accomplish an optimum plant density of around 9 plants per sq. ft.

Camelina's capacity might enable Uzbekistan to begin breaking out of its most dolorous legacy, the imposition of a cotton monoculture that has deformed the country's attempts at agrarian reform because attaining independence in 1991. Beginning in the late 19th century, the Russian federal government determined that Central Asia would become its cotton plantation to feed Moscow's growing fabric industry. The process was sped up under the Soviets. While Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Tajikistan and Turkmenistan were also purchased 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 become self-sufficient in cotton; 5 decades later 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 stays wedded to cotton, producing about 3.6 million heaps annually, which brings in more than $1 billion while making up around 60 percent of the country's hard cash income.

Beginning in the mid-1960s the Soviet government's regulations for Central Asian cotton production largely bankrupted the area's scarcest resource, water. Cotton utilizes 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 main rivers, the Amu Darya and Syr Darya, into inefficient irrigation canals, leading to the remarkable 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 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 recently explained camelina's company 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 amass $230."

Central Asia has the land, the farms, the watering infrastructure and a modest wage scale in contrast to America or Europe - all that's missing is the foreign investment. U.S. investors have the cash and access to the expertise of America's land grant universities. What is particular is that biofuel's market share will grow gradually; less certain is who will profit of establishing it as a feasible issue in Central Asia.

If the current past is anything to pass 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 knowledge, if they want to follow the Silk Road into developing a new market. Certainly anything that lessens water usage and pesticides, diversifies crop production and improves the lot of their agrarian population will receive most careful consideration from Central Asia's governments, and farming and grease processing plants are not just much more affordable than pipelines, they can be built faster.

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