DCML: Boosting Applying Experience of NILM with Dilated Convolution and Multi-Task Learning
ZhangMengru Zhao, Fan Wu, Huaqing Wu, Tong Liu, Conghao Zhou, Jun Ma, Yongmin Zhang, Feng Lyu · 2024
Non-intrusive load monitoring (NILM) is a promising approach for recognizing various electrical equipment energy usage patterns from aggregate load data. In this paper, we investigate the development of an NILM model to achieve high recognition accuracy, ensure a small model size for lightweight implementation, and enhance its adaptability to a wide range of appliance types. Specifically, we propose a framework named DCML, which employs dilated convolution to precisely control the receptive field, allowing efficient adjustments in feature extraction granularity to meet the specific requirements of different appliances. In addition, multi-task learning techniques are incorporated to allow simultaneous recognition of multiple appliances from a single model, saving model space while ensuring high recognition accuracy. Compared to the benchmark, our model reduces the recognition mean absolute error (MAE) by $36.8 \%, 16.8 \%$, and $43.8 \%$ for fridges, microwaves, and washing machines, respectively. Furthermore, the proposed DCML can significantly save the storage space of convolutional layers when simultaneously recognizing multiple appliances.