2017 the 5th IEEE International Conference on Smart Energy Grid Engineering

A Survey of a Residential Load Profile for Demand Side Management Systems

Onur Elma, Uğur S. Selamoğullar

Department of Electrical Engineering
Yıldız Technical University,
Istanbul, Turkey
e-mail: onurelma@yildiz.edu.tr, selam@yildiz.edu.tr

Abstract—Management of residential electricity consumption
is one of the important issues for energy efficiency and future
smart grid systems since residential demand constitutes large
percent of overall electrical energy consumption. Therefore,
demand side management systems, named as home energy
management systems at the residential level, are being
implemented under the new smart grid concept. Analyzing the
performances of home energy management systems requires
generating different realistic residential demand profiles since
the residential demand is highly complex comprising several
factors such as occupancy, climate, user preferences, and types
of appliances. This study provides the result of a survey
analysis that can be used to generate such realistic residential
demand profiles. In the survey, information about the user
preferences for appliance use time and duration and about
user will to be part of a demand control program are obtained.
Results of the survey together with experimentally measured
power values of appliances are used to produce sample
representative load profiles for a weekday and for a weekend.
These load profiles can be used in the evaluation of home
energy management systems.
Keywords-residential loads profiles; home energy
management; demand side management; smart grid
I. INTRODUCTION
The need for electrical energy is increasing with
developing world. Thus, the power grid needs to be operated
smarter and more controlled way to meet the increasing
demand. Within the smart grid concept, the customer side
must be controllable so that the power demand on the
customer side can be supplied more efficiently.
The residential demand constitute large percent of the
overall electrical energy demand. For example, the
residential demand is approximately 26% of the overall
electrical demand in Turkey while this number is 37% in the
USA [1], [2]. The electrical energy consumption in the world
increases around 3.4% each year [3]. Therefore, making the
residential power demand monitorable and controllable via
smart systems will provide considerable benefits to both
customer and energy generation company [3], [4]. Recently,
smart grid concept has emerged as a solution to more
efficient use of existing power system and demand side
management systems at residential level, names as home
energy management systems, are being implemented under
smart grid concept [3], [5]–[7].
To implement demand side management at residential
level, the residential power demand needs to be analyzed as
it is very dynamic and complex comprising several factors
such as occupancy, climate, user preferences, and types of
appliances. Studies about determination of residential load
profiles have been completed in the past [8], [9]. In [10],
characteristics of residential energy consumption in China is
acquired based on the related survey about home energy
consumption [10]. In another study, residential electrical
consumption is analyzed via stochastic model for electrical
loads in Mediterranean residential customers [11]. In
addition, dynamic pricing structure is used by the countries
where the energy marketing is spreading. In order to improve
of this structure, the residential electrical demand dynamic
and the management of this demand are studied [12].
Incentive programs need to be implemented to encourage
residential customers to actively participate demand
management so that the power demand of the residential
customer can be supplied at appropriate times by the utility.
For this purpose studies on various home energy
management algorithms are being conducted [13]–[16].
In literature, the measurement and analysis of the
residential load demand is mainly used for more efficient use
of electrical energy, energy quality, dynamic pricing,
demand response application, etc. Typically, hourly
consumption values are used in demand modeling. This
study provides a survey analysis to generate representative
residential demand profile of a house to be used in
performance analyses of home energy management systems.
In the survey, information about the user preferences for
appliance use time and duration and about user will to be
part of a demand control program are obtained. The results
of the survey together with experimentally measured power
values at each minute of common home appliances are used
to produce representative load profiles for a weekday and for
a weekend. These load profiles can be used in the evaluation
of home energy management systems.
This paper is organized as follows. Section II describes
the specifications of demand side management systems.
Considered home appliances and their measured power
values are also given in Section II. Details of the conducted
survey and obtained results are given in Section III. The last
section concludes the study with some remarks.
II. DEMAND SIDE MANAGEMENT
Electric utility companies and governments are moving
towards demand side management due to the inefficiency in
conventional power grid and due to cost of supplying power
when required. With demand side management, energy

978-1-5386-1776-2/17/$31.00 ©2017 IEEE 

sources can be used more efficiently as the demand side can the user preferences for appliance use time and duration and
be forced to follow the generation at any time. Two main about user will to be part of a demand control program are
approaches in demand side management systems are given obtained. Based on the survey results, average usage profiles
as incentive based systems and price based systems as shown of all electric appliances are obtained for a working Turkish
in Fig. 1. In the incentive based systems, customers are given family.
some benefits in return to accepting certain conditions
imposed by the utility. In the price based systems, customers TABLE I. RESIDENTIAL ELECTRICAL APPLIANCES AND THEIR
POWER VALUES*
can actively participate in demand response based on the
price information. Real time information exchange between Measured Measured
Electrical Electrical
the customer side and the utility side is the key factor for Appliances
Power
Appliances
power
these systems. (kW) (kW)

Refrigerator 0.160 Heater 1.790

Iron 1.970 Hair straightener 0.140

Toaster 0.700 Oven 2.150

Kettle 1.700 Cooker hood 0.190

Hair dryer 1.400 Dishwasher 1.770

TV 0.088 Microwave oven 1.200

Cordless phone 0.005 Printer 0.009

PC desktop 0.055 Vacuum cleaner 1.500
PC monitor 0.017 Stove top 1.050
Lighting 0.012 Wash machine 1.810
AC 1.100
*Yokogawa CW240 power analyzer is used for power measurements.

The questions in the survey can be classified into three

Figure 1. Demand side management approaches.
Management of residential electricity consumption is one
of the important issues for energy efficiency and future smart
grid systems since residential demand constitutes large
percent of overall electrical energy consumption. Therefore,
demand side management systems, named as home energy
management systems at the residential level, are being
implemented under the new smart grid concept. Home
energy management systems are becoming more and more
common with increasing number of smart home appliances.
Analyzing the performances of home energy
management systems requires generating different realistic
residential demand profiles since the residential demand is
highly complex comprising several factors such as
occupancy, climate, user preferences, and types of appliances.
This study provides the result of a survey analysis that
can be used to generate such realistic residential demand
profiles. Results of the survey together with experimentally
measured power values of appliances given in Table I are
used to produce sample representative load profiles for a
weekday and for a weekend. These load profiles can be used
in the evaluation of home energy management systems.
III. SURVEY STUDY FOR TURKISH RESIDENTIAL DEMAND
PROFILING
An online survey is prepared and 50 different family
responses are collected [17]. In the survey, information about
groups: questions about the life style, questions about the
appliances found in the home and questions about the user
preferences on the appliance use time and duration. Sample
questions are given below to give an idea of the conducted
survey. It should be noted that appliance related questions
are same for all appliances:
x Will you permit shifting your appliances for
reduced electricity bill?
x What is your average monthly electricity bill?
x Please identify appliances used in your house.
x Which day(s) do you generally use your washing
machine?
x How many times do you use your washing machine
in a week?
x What is the time frame you use your washing
machine in a weekday?
x What is the time frame you use your washing
machine in a weekend?
x How long does the washing cycle generally last?
The result of the question ‘Will you permit shifting your
appliances for reduction your electricity bill?’ is given in Fig.
2. As seen, around 80% of families accepts appliance
shifting to reduce their electricity bill. The appliance shifting
can be done locally or the utility can control the appliance
when required based on the electricity price, peak loading
condition, etc.


 As seen in Fig. 4, washing machine and oven are mostly
used on Saturdays while dishwasher is used almost everyday.

a) b)

Figure 2. Result of the question ‘Will you permit shifting your appliances
for reduction your electricity bill?’.

The result of the question ‘Please identify the appliances c)

found in your home’ is given in Fig. 3. As seen, microwave
oven, AC, dryer, water heater, electrical heater, printer are
not very common in Turkish homes.
d)
Figure 5. Result of the question ‘What is the time frame you use your
washing machine/dishwaher/iron/oven in a weekday?’ (a) Washing
machine (b) Dishwasher (c) Iron (d) Oven

a) b)

Figure 3. The answer to the question: ‘Please identify the appliances c)

found in your home’. d)
Figure 6. Result of the question ‘What is the time frame you use your
Result of questions ‘Which day(s) do you generally use washing machine/dishwasher/iron/oven in a weekend?’ (a) Washing
your washing machine/dishwasher/iron/oven’, ‘What is the machine (b) Dishwasher (c) Iron (d) Oven.
time frame you use your washing
machine/dishwasher/iron/oven in a weekday?’ and ‘What is As seen in Fig. 5 and Fig. 6, appliances use times are
the time frame you use your washing distributed over a day during the weekend when compared to
machine/dishwasher/iron/oven in a weekend?’ are given in weekday time of use data. Specifically, the use of washing
Fig. 4, Fig. 5 and Fig. 6, respectively. machine shifts to day hours during the weekend.
Using the survey results together with the measured
power values of appliances, representative daily load profiles
for summer/winter weekday and weekend are generated for a
working family. In the representative weekday load profile,
most appliances are used either in the morning from 06:00 to
08:00 and in the evening from 17:00 to midnight. In the
a) b) representative weekend load profile, the space heater runs all
day because homeowners are at home. While the peak load is
in the morning for the weekday, it is in the evening for the
weekend. As expected, the load demand becomes high in the
morning and at night times and for the weekend as well.
Obtained load profiles for winter/summer weekend and
winter/summer weekday are given in Fig. 7-Fig. 10
d) respectively.
c)
When winter and summer load profiles are compared it
Figure 4. Result of the question ‘Which day(s) do you generally use your can be seen that the peak loading hours are shifted in time as
washing machine/dishwasher/iron/oven’ (a) Washing machine (b) expected. The peak loading value is almost the same for both
Dishwasher (c) Iron (d) Oven. winter and summer cases.



Figure 7. Obtained demand profile for summer weekend.
Figure 8. Obtained demand profile for winter weekend.
Figure 9. Obtained demand profile for summer weekday.
Figure 10. Obtained demand profile for winter weekday.
IV. CONCLUSIONS
With the development of smart grid concept, the demand
profile of a customer becomes an important part of a demand
management system. The residential demand also constitutes
a large percent of the overall electrical consumption and
needs to be accurately modeled for performance analyses of
home energy management studies. Here, the results of a
survey study together with the measured power values of
home appliances are used to generate realistic representative
residential load profiles for a working family in Turkey. In

the survey, appliance use time and duration of the appliance
usage are the main questions as combining this information
with the measured power values give total residential
demand. Four representative residential demand profiles for
summer/winter weekday and summer/winter weekend are
given. These load profiles can be used in the evaluation of
home energy management systems.
Such representative load profiles provide valuable
information such as peak demand intervals and the
approximate peak demand (about 7 kW in this study) to
utility companies so that they can manage their generation
asset more efficiently. Also, these load profiles can be used
to determine dynamic electricity price as utilities are moving
towards to dynamic pricing scheme under smart grid concept.
In addition, the effect of residential peak demand reduction
on the power system losses can be analyzed to achieve
economical operation of the power system. The generated
load profiles in this study will provide the required data for
such future studies.
ACKNOWLEDGMENT
This work was supported in part by Yıldız Technical
University Research Projects Fund under Grant 2014-04-02-
DOP01.
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