An accurate method to predict annual heat load profiles is fundamental to many studies, e.g., preliminary design or potential studies on renewable heating systems. This study presents a method to predict annual heat load profiles with a daily resolution for industry and commerce, based on an analysis of 800 natural gas load profiles (≥ 1.5 GWh/a). To derive heat load profiles, these natural gas load profiles are normalized and those with a potentially non-linear relationship between heat demand and natural gas ...