Small Wind Turbines (SWTs) are promissory for distributed generation using renewable energy sources; however, their deployment in a broad sense requires to address topics related to their cost-efficiency. This paper aims to survey recent developments about SWTs holistically, focusing on multidisciplinary aspects such as wind resource assessment, rotor aerodynamics, rotor manufacturing, control systems, and hybrid micro-grid integration. Wind resource produces inputs for the rotor’s aerodynamic design that, in turn, defines a blade shape that needs to be achieved by a manufacturing technique while ensuring structural integrity. A control system may account for the rotor’s aerodynamic performance interacting with an ever-varying wind resource. At the end, the concept of integration with other renewable source is justified, according to the inherent variability of wind generation. Several commercially available SWTs are compared to study how some of the previously mentioned aspects impact performance and Cost of Electricity (CoE). Understanding these topics in the whole view may permit to identify both tendencies and unexplored topics to continue expanding SWTs market.

Different isolated systems with conventional generation sources are installed in Non-Interconnected Areas (ZNI) in Colombia while off-grid renewable systems are a trending answer for the energy supply in these regions. The complementarity between different energy sources, a storage system and adequate control can substantially improve the reliability of isolated generation systems. In this context, the sizing of a Hybrid Renewable Energy System (HRES) by means of a Genetic Algorithm (GA) is presented, considering the wind and solar resources specific to a representative rural location in Colombia. The methodology involves power curves for small wind turbines and the model for photovoltaic solar panels. The preliminary output consists of a weighted distribution for each technology, either wind or conventional photovoltaics, and is constrained by the Loss of Power Supply Probability (LPSP) and the Levelized Cost Of Electricity (LCOE). A second step consists of the optimization of the installed area for photovoltaic generation, considering a Concentrated Photovoltaic (CPV) system and aiming to maintain the initial fraction of generation for this resource. Finally, an analysis is performed on the reduction of area for solar generation to the increase in costs derived from the use of concentrators and other penalties associated with this technology.