Data sources were empirical as well as collected from secondary sources. A primary level field survey was
conducted on rice mills in Hooghly and Burdwan district in West Bengal to collect information on the capacity of
the mill, the capacity of the gasifier installed in the rice mill, cost of installation of the gasifier and the amount of
subsidy provided by the government, hours of operation of the mill and the gasifier, frequency of maintenance, type
of failures, labor charges, diesel replacement, and electricity consumption. Information on the amount of paddy
milled per year, rice husk generation, own consumption of rice husk with or without the gasifier in the rice mill and
annual surplus availability were also collected by physically visiting the mills. The study has been carried out by
filling up structured questionnaire during the field survey. About 10% of the total rice mills in the state, where
gasifiers were installed have been selected for the study. The selection was made by random sampling method.
Hooghly and Burdwan district were selected because majority of the rice mills in West Bengal are situated in these
districts.