Non-Intrusive Load Monitoring Approaches for Disaggregated Energy Sensing: A Survey

TLDR

Appliance Load Monitoring provides appliance‑specific consumption data for energy management, but fine‑grained monitoring with smart outlets is costly; Non‑Intrusive Load Monitoring offers a cost‑effective alternative by disaggregating energy use from a single measurement point. The paper surveys NILM systems and the methods used for disaggregated energy sensing. It reviews state‑of‑the‑art load signatures, disaggregation algorithms, and discusses challenges and future research directions.

Abstract

Appliance Load Monitoring (ALM) is essential for energy management solutions, allowing them to obtain appliance-specific energy consumption statistics that can further be used to devise load scheduling strategies for optimal energy utilization. Fine-grained energy monitoring can be achieved by deploying smart power outlets on every device of interest; however it incurs extra hardware cost and installation complexity. Non-Intrusive Load Monitoring (NILM) is an attractive method for energy disaggregation, as it can discern devices from the aggregated data acquired from a single point of measurement. This paper provides a comprehensive overview of NILM system and its associated methods and techniques used for disaggregated energy sensing. We review the state-of-the art load signatures and disaggregation algorithms used for appliance recognition and highlight challenges and future research directions.