A method identifies electric load types of a plurality of different electric loads. The method includes providing a load feature database of a plurality of different electric load types, each of the different electric load types including a first load feature vector having at least four different load features; sensing a voltage signal and a current signal for each of the different electric loads; determining a second load feature vector comprising at least four different load features from the sensed voltage signal and the sensed current signal for a corresponding one of the different electric loads; and identifying by a processor one of the different electric load types by determining a minimum distance of the second load feature vector to the first load feature vector of the different electric load types of the load feature database.