With the looming energy crisis and increasing awareness of environmental concerns, countries around the world are looking for alternate sources of energy. One of the frontrunners on the list of solutions is the energy of the wind.

As of 2008, the total global wind power capacity was over 120,000 megawatts, with the United States as the country with the highest capacity, according to The American Wind Energy Association Annual Wind Industry Report. About 1.5 percent of the energy produced worldwide comes from wind turbines.

You may know that wind turbines have been going up in Minnesota for a few years now, as well as in North Dakota and South Dakota. In fact, Xcel Energy has created a total of 1,300 megawatts of wind energy capacity in Minnesota, North Dakota and South Dakota combined, according to the company’s Web site.

What a lot of people don’t know, however, is that Xcel has started a wind energy program here in Wisconsin as well.

The program is called Windsource and is available for a small fee each month. Through the program, wind energy is sold in blocks of 100-kilowatt-hours (KWh). Xcel’s Web site lists the average home usage as between 600 and 1,000 KWh a month. My boyfriend and I, in our one-bedroom apartment, use a lot less than that – between 200 and 300 KWh a month.

The Windsource program is extremely flexible. Xcel customers sign up for between one and nine blocks a month, at $1.15 a piece. The number of blocks chosen depends on their typical power usage and how much they wish to contribute to the program. Alternatively, for a little over $10 a month, they can sign up to be 100 percent Windsource supporters, and all the energy they use will come through the program.

The extra fee is simply added on to the monthly energy bill, and if a customer signs up for more blocks than he or she actually uses, Xcel will only charge for the amount used. That means that my boyfriend and I, although we initially signed up for five blocks, pay about $3 a month to have our entire apartment powered by wind turbines.

Our planet needs us to take care of it. Our current methods of accommodating our energy needs are horrible for the environment. Burning fossil fuels creates a lot of pollution, and the waste from Nuclear power plants is extremely hazardous and toxic. Since there’s no way of getting rid of that waste apart from waiting a few thousand years, it just ends up buried in the ground.

There are a lot better energy sources out there, and we can help the use of those sources spread across the globe. As long as there’s wind, we can use its energy. (And if there isn’t wind, we have a lot more pressing concerns than the search for renewable energy.)

The Windsource program and others like it are extremely important for the well-being of the Earth.

If you live in an apartment or house with three other people – as a fair number of college students do – it would cost you each about $2.50 a month for all of your electricity to come through the Windsource program. Is it worth $2.50 a month to switch to a renewable energy source?

I say it is.

To sign up, all you need to do is go to www.xcelenergy.com/windsource or call 1-800-895-4999.

For a few dollars a month, you can make a difference. Please do.