Design and Implementation of An Energy-Efficient Extension Board with Integrated Overcurrent Protection for Home Appliances

Electrical extension boards are a major cause of electrical fires in homes, university hostels, offices, and other key applications worldwide, often due to overloading beyond their rated capacity. Additionally, users frequently forget to turn off appliances like televisions, portable fans, or electric irons, resulting in unnecessary energy waste. These Extension boards, commonly used to power multiple electrical appliances, are widespread in homes and universities, but overloading them can lead to overheating, burning, and potential fire hazards. This is often due to exceeding the board’s rated capacity, which reduces load resistance and increases current flow, particularly in parallel connected domestic loads. To address this risk, this paper presents an innovative energy efficient extension board equipped with overcurrent protection. The system continuously monitors the current drawn by connected appliances and automatically isolates them via a relay mechanism when the load exceeds the rated capacity of 13 amperes. The overcurrent status is displayed on an LCD. A microcontroller, interfaced with a current sensor and relay, manages the process, ensuring the safety of the extension boards and home appliances. Additionally, a buzzer notifies the user of the system's status. Furthermore, the system features a timer function to manage energy consumption based on user defined settings. Both simulation and experimental prototype were employed to verify the design, and the results showed a strong correlation between the expected and actual performance, demonstrating the practicality of the proposed system.