Patent ID: 8412491

Claim:
A system for detecting activation of at least one appliance of a plurality of appliances of different types, the system comprising: a plurality of customer premises, each of the customer premises comprising: a sensor configured to generate a customer load profile indicating an overall load of the plurality of appliances; and communication functionality for communicating the customer load profile to a utility management system, and the utility management system configured to: receive the customer load profile from the sensor; compare at least part of the customer load profile with a reference pattern corresponding to each of the at least one appliance; determine, based on the comparison, for a predetermined time period, times in which the each of the at least one appliance is operating at the customer premises; determine an amount of electricity used by the at least one appliance during the predetermined period; determine a modified operation of the at least one appliance; determine a modified amount of electricity the at least one appliance would use in the modified operation during the predetermined period; and communicate both the amount and the modified amount to the customer premises for comparison.