The Savonius wind turbine appears to be particularly promising for low power applications, such as those in urban areas, and it can take advantage of a simple, reliable and cost-effective construction. Anyway, the Savonius wind turbine suffers from poor performance, when compared with other wind turbines having a major overall complexity and higher costs. For this reason, several studies have been carried-out in recent years in order to improve its energy performance. The aim of the present work is to enhance the aerodynamic performance of the Savonius wind rotor following two different approaches: the first one is based on the development of innovative airfoil-shaped blades, while the second one concerns the use of a new curtain system, self-orienting relative to the wind direction. For the purpose of the present work has been applied a customized numerical model, previously validated by means of experimental data obtained at the environmental wind tunnel of the Universita Politecnica delle Marche. The obtained results show that both the approaches here proposed, following two distinct guidelines for the development of new and more efficient rotor geometries, are able to produce sensible enhancements in terms of the energy performance of the Savonius wind turbine. (C) 2014 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.