The award is sponsored by insurance company TM and the outstanding entry was judged to be the system for cooling groundfish to a temperature of 0.7°C and salmon to -1.5°C. The award went to Gunnar Thórðarson at research and innovation group Matís and Albert Högnason of 3X Technology.
This innovative technology eliminates the need for ice on fishing vessels to chill fish, instead utilising the liquids in the meat itself as a cooling medium. As well as removing the need to manufacture and use ice at sea, the results of this supercooling system show that no damaging ice crystals form in the fish, and the shelf life of the product is extended significantly.
This process has already been tested on board one Icelandic stern trawler that was refitted for this purpose, with un-iced fish stored in its fishroom at a steady temperature at slightly below zero. Several of the newbuilds now due to join the Icelandic fleet over the next year will employ this innovative storage technique.
It is expected to offer great advantages for fresh exports, in particular by air, by removing the need for the substantial weight of ice that has to be shipped along with the fish.
Awards also went to a development project for an environmentally-friendly longline vessel being developed by the Hafið Centre of Excellence and a group of associated companies, and to a proposal for a remotely-controlled small vessel for operating inshore.
