User-centric recommendations on energy-efficient appliances in smart grids: A Multi-task learning approach

Abstract

Deploying energy-efficient appliances is one of the most effective ways to save energy bills for residents. However, the existing recommender systems for energy-efficient appliances passively rely on energy consumption patterns without the knowledge of users’ true needs. This paper proposes a user-centric energy-efficient appliance personalized recommender system (EEA-PRS) based on information collected from load monitoring platforms and e-commerce websites. The proposed system is built in a novel multi-task learning approach to collaboratively infer user's preference on: (1) common types of appliances that appear in historical data; (2) energy-efficient models of common appliances; and (3) types of appliances that are novel to the users. The proposed system provides supervisory recommendation services with user feedback preferences on appliances as data labeling, which enables closed-loop evaluation to adhere to users’ needs and interests. Simulation studies with comparative analysis have been conducted to validate its leading recommendation performance in terms of conforming to user preferences.