Many people think of cremation as a more Earth-friendly way of dealing with their remains on this post-mortal coil, but what about the energy expended converting our body to ashes? What about the air pollution, such as mercury, from that conflagration? And what about the potential soil nutrients that this steals from the ground? In my opinion, I’ve lived off of the nutrients provided by the world for many years and have a moral obligation to give something nutritious back upon my death.
That’s why I’m pleased to see the growing field of green funerals. No longer do we need to be shackled to the traditional Christian burial process of embalming, placing in a air-tight elaborate casket and entombing the casket in a concrete vault.
A green burial is, as you might expect, a much less elaborate affair. In fact, as Josh Slocum, executive director of the Funeral Consumers Alliance, said to me, “If you want to know what a green burial is, ask your great-great-grandparents.”
Slocum said that a green burial is all about what you don’t buy. You can cross off embalming and use a simple wood box (built locally).
There are more aspects to a green burial, however, than simplifying the body preparation and container. There are green cemeteries and natural woodland areas. The cemeteries often will allow the marking of a grave with only a stone or plant or plaque set flush with the ground. The area will be allowed to return to nature, its abundance fertilized by the deceased.
There is three types of green burial grounds:
- Hybrid, which allow burials without anything to protect the casket, and accepts uncremated bodies.
- Natural Burial Grounds, which prohibit bodies embalmed with toxic chemicals, any features such as vault lids that would retard decomposition, any caskets not made of a natural material, and the grounds must be designed to maintain a natural appearance.
- Conservation Burial Grounds, which “must protect in perpetuity an area of land specifically and exclusively designated for conservation.”
Slocum cautioned “You cannot consume your way to conservation.” When the day comes that I’m done consuming, a green burial might be an appropriate way to hold my place in the food chain; above cows and just below worms.
