Brass patented a technique for the first industrial scale distillation of metallic zinc known as "distillation per descencum" or "the English process." This local zinc was used in speltering and allowed greater control over the zinc content of brass and the production of high-zinc copper alloys which would have been difficult or impossible to produce using cementation, for use in expensive objects such as scientific instruments, clocks, brass buttons and costume jewellery. However Champion continued to use the cheaper calamine cementation method to produce lower-zinc brass and the archaeological remains of bee-hive shaped cementation furnaces have been identified at his works
American Brass Superfund site and extensive soil and groundwater contamination. After assessment by the EPA, it was added to the National Priorities List, in May 1999, for long-term remedial action. American Brass Superfund site The American Brass Superfund site is a former industrial site, located in Henry County, Alabama. American Brass Inc. (ABI) operated a brass smelter and foundry facility on the site between 1978-1992. Prior to its closure in December 1992, the company had been cited by the United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), and the Alabama Department of Environmental Management, (ADEM), on several occasions for Resource Conservation and Recovery Act (RCRA) violations,