An efficient appliance scheduling approach for cost and peak minimization in a smart home

In this research paper, the problem of scheduling the home appliances is addressed. Generally, the householder’s main attention is focused on minimizing his electricity payment by moving the use of the appliance from hours of high electricity rates to hours of low electricity rates. Consequently, the problem of peak demand is created. Thus, the main target behind this work is to propose an efficient scheduling strategy so that the electricity payment is reduced, the peak demand is minimized, and the user’s comfort is maintained. The proposed scheduling problem is mathematically elaborated as Mixed-Integer Linear Programming where the decision variables indicate whether the electrical appliances are switched ON/OFF. The proposed strategy is implemented in four different scenarios with 10 appliances and proved to be efficient, simple, and reliable. To scrutinize the efficiency of the suggested method, similar studies in literature are used for comparison. Findings prove that the proposed method accurately minimizes the electricity payments, the peak demand while completing the 100% task required at the end of the day with lower computational time response.