Last night our publisher, Brian Hicks, invited me out to dinner with his family. We went to this Afghani restaurant where I devoured my Kaddo Borawni.

For those of you unfamiliar with this dish, it's basically pan fried and baked pumpkin that's seasoned with sugar and served on yogurt garlic sauce.

If you've never had it, that description may not sound so tempting. But I have to tell you, sometimes what may seem like the oddest combinations can offer up the best rewards.

Look at environmentalism and capitalism for example.

I can't even describe the looks I used to get from environmentalists when I would tell them that Wall Street would be their biggest ally in the fight to further the integration of alternative energy.

And the looks weren't much different when I would tell investors that they could make a boatload of cash by investing in alternative energy.

But here we are today with both an alternative energy bull market AND more alternative energy integrated into our energy infrastructure than ever before. A trend that's not likely to let up for at least the next few decades.

In fact, the alternative energy market has matured so much over the past few years, we're now starting to see some alternative energy stocks being labeled as "safe."

Five years ago, you wouldn't find a single analyst calling an alternative energy stock safe.

But today, that's exactly what we're looking at.

Our favorite "safe" play in this sector right now is Ormat Technologies.

This geothermal powerhouse has been delivering for us since 2005. And with the burgeoning demand for geothermal coupled with Ormat's position as "top dog" in the sector, this is certainly a safer way to play the alternative energy market.

Of course, speculation still provides a lot of momentum in this market, too.

Not to mention profits.

Take a look at Ener1 (ENEI.OB) for example.

Here's a stock that I told investors about last month at our Profit from the Peak Summit in Philadelphia.

This is a high-performance battery company looking to capitalize on the coming Plug-In Hybrid Electric Vehicle (PHEV) boom.

This thing was trading for only $0.25 a share in September. And those that didn't have the stomach for speculation back then stayed far away from this one.

Conversely, those drawn to speculation as a way to make more money and faster definitely hit the jackpot if they picked up shares at that price.

Take a look:

Now I'll be honest, at Green Chip Stocks, we diversify with just a little speculation. But most of our plays are safer, long-term plays.

We do this because we realize that not everyone is comfortable with speculation.

Though we did launch a new speculator service in July. You'll be hearing more about that in a few days.

That being said, there's no reason you can't seek out your own speculative plays based on the information we provide you with here.

For example, we've been speculating that the high-performance battery market is going to soar in 2008 as the price of oil increases . Primarily because the high price of oil will continue to support PHEV momentum, thereby creating demand for the batteries that'll power these things.

You already saw how well Ener1 has performed recently.

And check out China BAK Battery (CBAK:NASDAQ) too:

You can't neglect the electric engine and car manufacturers, either.

Companies like UQM Technologies (UQM:AMEX), Enova (ENA:AMEX) and Zap (ZAAP.OB) are also highly speculative, but offer a lot of potential with oil getting closer and closer to $100 a barrel.

Now these are just a few examples . . . NOT recommendations.

Though for the sake of full disclosure, Ener1, UQM and Zap have either been in, or currently are in the Alternative Energy Trader portfolio.

You see, what I'm trying to do here is show you that when it comes to alternative energy, there's a lot of money to be made in smart speculation, as well as "safe" plays.

And if you're ready to step it up a notch, and take on a little more risk (with expectations of greater rewards), now is the time to do it. Because there's a lot more support in this sector than there was five years ago. And this makes these speculative plays a lot more attractive.

I'll have more on alternative energy speculation in the weeks to come.

Until then . . .

Jeff