Abstract: A set-top box sets a plurality of energy consumption thresholds corresponding to a plurality of electrical appliances. The set-top box transmits a plurality of energy request commands to the plurality of electrical appliances via a power line communication (PLC) transport protocol to request for energy consumption of the plurality of electrical appliances, and receives a plurality of energy response messages from the plurality of electrical appliances via the PLC transport protocol. The plurality of energy response messages includes the energy consumption of the plurality of electrical appliances. The set-top box determines whether each energy consumption of each electrical appliance exceeds the corresponding energy consumption threshold, and generates an energy alarm to notify a user that at least one electrical appliance will be powered off when the energy consumption of the at least one electrical appliance exceeds the corresponding energy consumption threshold.