IoT Based Smart Energy Management in Residential Applications

The lack of credibility of data acquired through traditional means from a conventional metering system has reduced the efficacy of the energy management system. For overcoming the drawbacks of the conventional metering system, this paper proposes a smart IoT based energy management system (EMS), which not only ensures transparency and credibility of data but also offers flexibility to the consumers by offering the facility of remotely controlling their home appliances. Electricity consumption and its corresponding cost is calculated automatically and then the data is sent to a server in a periodic manner. For carrying out the task, NodeMCU has been utilized, which has the combined functionality of both microcontroller and Wi-Fi modules. By means of its microcontroller function, constant readings of energy meter are collected and saved in NodeMCU; then the data is transferred to a remote server on the internet via Wi-Fi. Consumers can observe real-time data on the server to gain a clear idea of electricity usage, therefore, they can reduce or increase the consumption as per their budget. This proposed system also provides the functionality of controlling the home appliances remotely over the Internet. Furthermore, electricity suppliers can produce bills from the server data automatically, making it a feasible solution. This paper also proposes and analyzes individual sub-metering of home appliances of high rating to observe and control their energy consumption. A detailed cost analysis of the system has been performed for ensuring its costeffectiveness. According to the analysis, the total cost associated with the system is BDT 1064, which is fairly economical compared with existing systems. The add-ons of this proposed system can be also integrated with the existing prepaid meters of the market, eradicating its major drawbacks by providing added functionality.