This study provides an opportunity to improve the turbine selection process. At the moment, a hydropower estimation software package HydrA-HP which was developed at the Centre for Ecology and Hydrology (CEH) in Wallingford, UK is widely used for turbine selection. It utilises the information on turbine performance envelopes which does not include the recent advances in the low head applications for heads less than 3m. The turbine selection process using HydrA-HP software is based predominantly on annual flow variations, but it does not take into account turbine size, variable turbine efficiency or cavitation problems. The software which has been described above can be developed further in several ways. This can include: more data on turbine performance envelopes; more dimensional calculations for different turbine types; more information on efficiency of different turbine types depending on the flow variation; turbine manufacturing costs. The data on the new technology represented in this paper are by no means exhaustive, but this is a first attempt to present the disperse information on the advances in turbine technologies and make it available to potential developers, hydro turbine manufacturers and the wider community.