Cold comfort it may be, but rest assured you're not the only one freaking out about sky-high heating bills this season. “How to Beat the Big Energy Chill,” in the current issue of Newsweek takes a fascinating look at the flipside of the heating-bill crisis: High oil prices amp up the economic argument for switching to alternative energy. Sure enough, as oil prices surpassed 60 dollars a barrel in recent months, investors have been seeing the logic in making the clean-power shift.

Renewable energy technologies such as solar, wind, and geotherman, once considered hippy-dippy fringe solutions, are now inching toward mainstream acceptance.

Clean-energy markets are glutted with investment as never before. The research outfit Worldwatch Institute recently revealed that private investors worldwide funneled a record-breaking $30 billion into renewable-energy markets in 2004. Investments in 2005 will be far higher—thanks in part to the setbacks that bedeviled the oil industry after a brutal hurricane season: Post-Katrina, investment into The Wilder Index, a renewable-energy fund, spiked to $25 million a week from $10 million a month.

Photo Illustration credit: Nitin Vadukul for Newsweek