Swansea University has presented an honorary degree to Dr John Francis Thrash, pioneering founder of green technologies including a profoundly large-scale capable CO2 sequestration system (VLSD) he created through one of the companies he founded, VLS Decarbonization Partners LLC, and Armchair Quantum Capacitors (AQC) which can be spooled and/or shaped into capacitors capable of very large energy storage. Dr Thrash is a champion of related technologies developed at Swansea University.
The award was presented to Dr Thrash 24 July 2019 during the University’s degree ceremony for the School of Management.
Dr Thrash, a licensed medical doctor, joined his parents' energy business in the late 1970s after practising medicine in Texas, and led the family companies through various green energy pursuits. Since 1998 he has been the Chairman and CEO of eCORP International, LLC, positioning the company as one of the first ‘green’ developers.
In recent years, VLSD and AQC technologies have been advanced through R&D collaborations involving academic and industry partners, the Energy Safety Research Institute (ESRI) at Swansea University along with an international array of academic and governmental institutions and funding agencies.
Dr Thrash has had a distinguished academic and research career and is the founding funding partner and Managing Director of the Center for Molecular Research in Infectious Disease which has been successful in developing innovative solutions to medical challenges.
On receiving his award, Dr Thrash said: “This honour is of huge personal significance as well as professionally so. The research we are achieving together with Swansea University on several fronts holds the promise of profoundly controlling emissions associated with certain forms of power generation coupled with massive sequestration of carbon dioxide removed from the atmosphere, on the one hand; while alternatively reducing power requirements through reduced transmission losses, on the other. I will be forever grateful for all those involved in the collaborations for VLSD and AQC.”