The wind has played a long and important role in the history of human civilization. The first known use of wind dates back 5,000 years to Egypt, where boats used sails to travel from shore to shore. The first true windmill, a machine with vanes attached to an axis to produce circular motion, may have been built as early as 2000 B.C. in ancient Babylon. By the 10th century A.D., windmills with wind-catching surfaces as long as 16 feet and as high as 30 feet were grinding grain in the area now known as eastern Iran and Afghanistan.

In the 1930’s, before large-scale rural electrification, some 600,000 windmills were producing electricity and pumping water on farms across the U.S. and Canada. Interest in wind energy re-emerged after the Oil Crisis of 1973 and by the late 1970’s there were nearly 50 wind turbine manufacturers in the U.S. alone. Much of the activity in the U.S. wind market died down after the cancellation of federal government tax incentives in the mid 1980’s. At that point, the largest commercial turbines rarely exceeded 150 kW, and the three-bladed, horizontal axis 'Danish design' established itself as a market leader. Tens of thousands of turbines were installed, particularly in California, and an inevitable “shakeout” of manufacturers and technologies took place. The turbines and industry players that survived helped establish wind power technology as a robust, dependable source of utility power. 

With the revival of the utility-scale wind energy market in the early 1990’s, turbine manufacturers and governments invested in technology research and development (R&D) to improve performance and cost. The most obvious manifestation of this progression has been the increase in the size of utility-scale wind turbines. The majority of commercial machines are now over 1 megawatt (MW), with turbines as large as 3 and 4 MW available.

In part due to the success of the 'large wind' industry, small wind turbines (i.e. those under 300 kW rated output) have developed into a distinct market unto themselves. In comparison to their 'large wind' cousins:

• Small wind turbine applications and marketing channels are significantly different;
• Small wind turbine are typically installed as single units, and;
• Small wind turbine include a greater technological variety.