We are sorry to remind you about something not all people like, but we know that everybody will eventually leave this life. We will all die, in the end, and death is indeed inevitable. But don’t you know that we can still give something to the nature when we die?
In this article, we are going to talk about the way we continue our story after death. No, we are not going to talk about afterlife, but rather us as a part of the nature. As naturally and basically we are organic matters, we will eventually become one with the nature after death.
Casket burial and cremation are two of the most common methods we use to dispose the dead. You might have experienced witnessing the process too, but have you ever thought about how eco-friendly those processes are? How much benefit that the nature can get from those processes?
Here in the article we will show you some alternative ways to dispose the dead, which are eco-friendlier.
The Common Methods
Before talking about the alternatives, let’s first talk about the common ways. Both of the methods commonly used, casket burial and cremation, are such long processes from the beginning to the final phase when the body is finally processed.
In casket burial, usually the body is embalmed. Embalming the body is not a pretty process, actually, because it usually uses chemicals like formaldehyde, glutaraldehyde, and phenol, which are known to cause cancer to living beings.
Not only that, the casket itself is not that eco-friendly. Most caskets are made of mined minerals, plastic, and endangered woods. Data showed that 30 million board feet of hardwoods, 90,000 tons of steel and 17,000 tons of copper and bronze are consumed annually for making casket.
In addition, using casket also prevents bodies to be decomposed efficiently. And rather than ground bacteria, sulfur-loving bacteria that can harm nearby water sources usually have the head start in the decomposition process when bodies are put in the casket.
Cremation is also not a greener method, because it produces air pollution from the burning process. Crematoriums are known to release a lot of airborne chemicals like dioxin, carbon dioxide, and even mercury into the atmosphere. It also consumes a lot of energy to do the process.
There are many alternatives to those common methods usually used, and here we will mention four of them. Those methods are natural burial, eco-coffin, eco-urn, and resomation.
The process of disposing the dead in natural burial is actually pretty similar as casket burial. However, natural burial consumes less resources and eco-friendlier than using casket. The reason is because it simply gets rid of the casket.
In green burial method, the dead are wrapped in biodegradable shrouds instead of being put into a casket. If that’s too simple, the dead can also be placed in a pine coffin and laid to rest until their body decompose naturally.
One example of natural burial provider is located in Larkspur Conservation in Tennessee, United States. “People (who) choose to be buried in this area are the people who want wildflowers blooming on their grave and butterflies fluttering about, said John Christian Phifer, Larkspur Executive Director, to NPR.
Imagine turning yourselves into beautiful wildflowers in the spring. By using natural burial, we can make sure that even though our souls have gone to heaven, we can still contribute a lot to the nature.
Different from tightly-closed coffins, eco-coffins make sure that ground bacteria can decompose the body easily. Thus, it can not only shorten the decomposition period, but also avoid sulfur-loving bacteria to get the head start.
There are various options of eco-coffins, such as paper coffins, formaldehyde-free plywood, fair trade-certified bamboo and hand-woven willow. We can see here that all those materials decompose easier than conventional coffins, and it means that the process would be more efficient.
One example of eco-coffin provider is Natural Burial Company. The company provides coffins and urns made of wicker. Another example is Shelves for Life. This coffin is rather unique, because basically it appears like just ordinary shelf.
However, the shelves can be easily transformed into coffins too, making sure not only it can be used as a coffin for the dead, but it can also work as a shelf for the living. Well, maybe this is the investment we all need for our own future.
If cremation is a must but you want to still make it greener somewhat, then you can choose to use eco-urns. Eco-urns are simply environmentally conscious urns which are made of wood, coconut shell, or compacted peat and cellulose.
Those eco-urns usually come with some tree seeds that can be planted directly after the process. This way, the seed will grow on the ash, which is organic. Most eco-urn providers even allow you to choose what kind of tree to be grown.
You will definitely be able to choose where you want to plant the tree, whether you want to plant it in your backyard as a reminder or someplace else with different reasons. Imagine planting it in the middle of the forest and let our deceased beloved ones become a part of it.
If you want to make your way to nature as quick as possible, then maybe resomation is the process that you might want to look at resomation. Resomation is a process where the body is sealed inside a tube filled with water and lye.
The tube is then heated into 300 degrees for three hours, resulting into about 200 gallons of fluid and bones. The bones will then be ground up and turned into ash. This way, the result is actually a liquid ‘corpse’, that can be simply poured into the ground and be absorbed by the plants.
Well, looking on those methods, you might find a new meaning for the phrase “life after death”. It shows clearly that you can still be friendly to the nature even if your soul has left this realm for the better place.