For the first time the German Innovation Award was awarded on the 30th of April, 2010 during a gala dinner in the Hotel Bayerischer Hof in Munich. The objective of the initiative of Accenture, EnBW, Evonik and the WirtschaftsWoche is to distinguish marketable innovations in the German economy. The jury evaluated sales opportunities, additional application possibilities and synergetic effects as well as economic efficiency and positive impacts on society and the environment.
Solarlite GmbH was honoured in the category "Startup". The jury was firstly impressed with the revolutionizing idea to produce parabolic troughs made out of composite materials with high precision for massproduction and secondly with the ability to generate direct steam in place of evaporating thermal oil. A new phase in the development of solar technology has been reached with the Solarlite technology. The modular design based on combining a light composite construction and an efficient thinglass mirror is advantageous in various aspects, for example a central production independent of the power plant sites as well as allowing different project sizes with no limitations. The direct evaporation of water instead of thermal oil and the option of cogeneration of thermal and electrical energy makes the energy production nearly free of CO2 and more environmentally friendly. Solarlite technology is able to reduce total investment costs of a power plant project and guarantees attractive prices as well as a reliable source of energy.
The decentralized modular system of Solarlite is unique in the world and can be used in various applications such as power production for feedin to the network or for standalone consumption of small and mediumsized industrial facilities. The construction method allows island solutions and smaller solar thermal parabolic trough plants starting from 500 kWe. Applications in combination with cogeneration can be used for the production of heat, absorption cooling or also for seawater desalination.
Rural regions without any grid connection located in sun belt areas can profit immensely from such technology. On 30th of April Solarlite's CFO, Moritz von Plate, was honoured in Munich on behalf of Solarlite's innovative founder and CEO Joachim Krüger and his 20 person team for their innovative work. Joachim Krüger was delighted by this honour: "In 2001 I first had the idea of building parabolic troughs made of lighter material in Thailand. Therefore I am very pleased that this idea developed over the last years into an innovative product by a pioneering company located in Mecklenburg-West Pomerania and was awarded with this mark of distinction."