A system, method, and device for identifying data sources for a neural network are disclosed. The exemplary system may have a module for determining load curves for each selected data set. The system may also have a module for determining a global difference measure and a global similarity measure for each load curve of each selected data set. The system may have a module for determining a set of data sets with lowest value global difference measure. The system may also have a module for determining a set of data sets with largest value global similarity measure. The system may also have a module for determining a union of the sets of lowest value difference measure and the sets of largest value similarity measure. The system may also have a module for determining for each set in the union one of a local similarity measure and a local difference measure and a module for selecting a set of reduced data sets based on one of the local similarity measure and the local difference measure.