Husk Power System is a social startup which aims to provide electricity to rural India. It utilizes rice husk which is available in ample amounts from the cultivation of rice in Bihar.The process starts with gasification of husk to form producer gas which is fed into a gas engine coupled with an alternator to generate electricity. The electricity is fed into the mini grids which cover about 2-3 villages for one plant. It is a very humble design but one which has far reaching implications for its customers in rural india. Till date HPS has 63 plants which serves 150 villages and 150,000 people.The power plants typically run for 6-7 hours a day in the evening (6p.m. – 12 a.m.). Power is sold according to fixed power connections in multiples of 50 W i.e. 50 W, 100 W,200 W. Customers are not billed based on how much energy they use but on the basis of the upper limit of power available to them. The average household requirement is normally around 100 W which is enough to power 3-4 CFLs and a mobile charging point.
We lived in a city called Bettiah in West Champaran (supposedly the bad lands of goons and crooks) district of Bihar.The economy of the city was almost completely dependent on agriculture, and you could see the use of of both auto rickshaws and horse-driven carts for transportation.
My work in HPS was divided into two parts.During the first phase, the objective of the project was to study the distribution networks of the company at various plants and to assess the performance of the mini-grids. The company currently operates 63 plants. We had to study 10 plants in total.
During the second phase, I was involved in HPS University. It is a very novel concept started by HPS to provide employment to the rural population. HPS offers paid training for the various posts in its operations such as Mechanic, Operator, Cluster Manager etc. At the end of 3 months of training they are provided full time employment in HPS. The best thing about this initiative is that even the uneducated and unskilled can apply for it. I was required to chart out a training and grading system for the training mechanics which involved physically simulating IC engine problems and grading mechanics on their skill set and quantifiying it through a skill grading system.
Among us interns we used to joke how the best term for our internship was “Rural Tourism”. We spent days in villages, meeting people from all walks of life. It is quite an experience when your worries in villages include looking for portable water to searching for food. Hygiene was a term we hardly cared about. To put things in perspective, in the villages all our meals were in shops compared to which Cheddis was a hotel.But in villages you can also see the power of a light bulb and the impact it can have on lives of villagers. Markets which earlier couldn’t function after evenings were now filled with people till 9 pm. HPS also provided free electricity to schools and community places.
It was a memorable experience to work in villages. Living conditions are pathetic and there is a state of complete chaos and development happens at a snail’s pace, but as the moto of HPS says “tamaso ma jyotirgamaya” meaning “Lead me from darkness to light”.
For more information on HPS you can visit their website www.huskpowersystems.com
Deepankar Pal
4th year undergraduate student
B.Tech Mechanical Engineering
