The current revelations of a International Energy Administration whistleblower that the IEA might have distorted crucial oil projections under extreme U.S. pressure is, if true (and whistleblowers hardly ever come forward to advance their careers), a slow-burning thermonuclear explosion on future international oil production. The Bush administration's actions in pushing the IEA to underplay the rate of decrease from existing oil fields while overplaying the chances of finding brand-new reserves have the potential to toss federal governments' long-lasting preparation into mayhem.
Whatever the reality, rising long term international demands appear specific to overtake production in the next decade, especially offered the high and increasing costs of developing brand-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 very first barrels of oil are produced.
In such a scenario, ingredients 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 forefront, among the richest possible production locations has actually been completely overlooked by investors already - Central Asia. Formerly the USSR's cotton "plantation," the region is poised to end up being a significant player in the production of biofuels if enough foreign investment can be obtained. Unlike Brazil, where biofuel is made largely from sugarcane, or the United States, where it is mostly distilled from corn, Central Asia's ace resource is a native plant, Camelina sativa.
Of the previous Soviet Caucasian and Central Asian republics, those clustered around the shores of the Caspian, Azerbaijan and Kazakhstan have actually seen their economies boom since of record-high energy prices, while Turkmenistan is waiting in the wings as a rising manufacturer of natural gas.
Farther to the east, in Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan, geographical seclusion and fairly scant hydrocarbon resources relative to their Western Caspian next-door neighbors have actually mostly hindered their ability to capitalize increasing global energy needs already. Mountainous Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan remain mainly dependent for their electrical requirements on their Soviet-era hydroelectric infrastructure, but their increased need to create winter electrical power has actually led to autumnal and winter season water discharges, in turn severely affecting the agriculture of their western downstream next-door neighbors Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan and Turkmenistan.
What these three downstream countries do have nevertheless is a Soviet-era legacy of farming production, which in Uzbekistan's and Turkmenistan case was mostly directed towards cotton production, while Kazakhstan, beginning in the 1950s with Khrushchev's "Virgin Lands" programs, has ended up being a significant producer of wheat. Based upon my discussions with Central Asian government officials, offered the thirsty demands 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 hardy financiers prepared to bank on the future, particularly as a plant native to the region has actually already shown itself in trials.
Known in the West as incorrect flax, wild flax, linseed dodder, German sesame and Siberian oilseed, camelina is drawing in increased clinical interest for its oleaginous qualities, with several European and American business currently investigating how to produce it in business amounts for biofuel. In January Japan Airlines undertook a historic test flight utilizing camelina-based bio-jet fuel, ending up being the very first Asian provider to explore 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 assessment of camelina's functional efficiency ability and prospective industrial viability.
As an alternative energy source, camelina has much to suggest 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 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 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 lot (1000 kg) of camelina will consist of 350 kg of oil, of which pushing can draw out 250 kg. Nothing in camelina production is lost as after processing, the plant's particles can be utilized for animals silage. Camelina silage has an especially attractive concentration of omega-3 fatty acids that make it a particularly fine animals feed prospect that is simply now acquiring acknowledgment in the U.S. and Canada. Camelina is fast growing, produces its own natural herbicide (allelopathy) and contends well against weeds when an even crop is developed. According to Britain's Bangor University's Centre for Alternative Land Use, "Camelina might 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 family, is indigenous to both Europe and Central Asia and hardly a brand-new crop on the scene: archaeological proof indicates it has actually been cultivated in Europe for at least three centuries to produce both grease and animal fodder.
Field trials of production in Montana, presently the center of U.S. camelina research study, showed a wide variety of results of 330-1,700 pounds of seed per acre, with oil content differing in between 29 and 40%. Optimal seeding rates have been figured out to be in the 6-8 lb per acre variety, as the seeds' small size of 400,000 seeds per pound can develop problems in germination to achieve 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 deformed the country's efforts at agrarian reform considering that accomplishing self-reliance 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 textile market. The process was accelerated under the Soviets. While Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Tajikistan and Turkmenistan were likewise ordered 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; five years later it had actually ended up being a major 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 tons every year, which brings in more than $1 billion while making up around 60 percent of the nation's tough currency earnings.
Beginning in the mid-1960s the Soviet federal government's instructions for Central Asian cotton production mostly 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 two primary rivers, the Amu Darya and Syr Darya, into ineffective irrigation canals, leading to the significant shrinkage of the rivers' final location, the Aral Sea. The Aral, as soon as the world's fourth-largest inland sea with a location of 26,000 square miles, has shrunk to one-quarter its initial size in one of the 20th century's worst eco-friendly catastrophes.
And now, the dollars and cents. Dr. Bill Schillinger at Washington State University just recently explained camelina's business design 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 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 investment. U.S. financiers have the money and access to the proficiency of America's land grant universities. What is particular is that biofuel's market share will grow in time; less specific is who will profit of developing it as a feasible issue in Central Asia.
If the recent past is anything to pass it is unlikely to be American and European investors, fixated as they are on Caspian oil and gas.
But while the Japanese flight experiments suggest Asian interest, American financiers 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 great deal of their agrarian population will receive most careful factor to consider from Central Asia's federal governments, and farming and veggie oil processing plants are not only more affordable than pipelines, they can be constructed faster.
And jatropha curcas's biofuel potential? Another story for another time.
