There’s a growing trend in the United States, a trend that has been popular in the UK, but is only now starting to gain awareness and popularity in America. What is it?
Green funerals!
There are a growing number of companies and cemeteries, especially in California, Texas, New York, and Florida, offering biodegradable caskets and other environmentally friendly burial options.
Natural embalming services at these cemeteries do not include the use of formaldehyde, cement vaults, laminated caskets, or chemical treatments normally used in conventional burials. Instead, options include natural-fiber shrouds and fair-trade bamboo caskets lined with cotton (unbleached). If bamboo isn’t your style, there are also other hand crafted natural wood choices. These biodegradable caskets run anywhere from $100 (basic cardboard) to $3,000 for a custom-painted wooden model.
Supporters of “green” burials say that these choices are far more environmentally friendly than traditional burials, or even cremation (because of the fossil fuels needed for cremation). Everything used for a natural burial is fully biodegradable.
So is this a fad, or is here to stay? With the funeral industry generating $11 billion each year in the USA, the market is potentially gigantic. Perhaps natural burials will continue to spread across America and stick around as yet another great personalization option for burials.
Natural burials are another example of how we’re moving forward by adopting methods of yesterday. After all, people were buried without chemicals and steel for ages. These days, more and more people are becoming more environmentally minded throughout their lives. Now it’s time for us to embrace nature in our deaths as well.
For more information on natural funerals and burials, visit these websites:
http://www.naturalburialcompany.com/
http://naturalburial.org/
http://www.naturalendings.co.uk/index.asp
Wow, even green funerals, that is amazing. I didn't know anything about this, and as an obsessive recycler and "green" person myself, its interesting to hear about this growing trend! Thanks for the info!
If you are going to be buried in nature, why not do it 100%?!
What a great idea! This is first I have heard of green funerals and I think it is a really great idea! The more we do to protect our environment, the more future generations will be able to enjoy of the Earth.
Thanks for posting this! I have always thought I would prefer cremation, but if their is a more environmentally friendly way to despose of my remains, I am definitely for it.
You're welcome. I recently learned about it myself, and I think it's an outstanding idea. We should spread the word!
Go to the grave, green. Sounds swell, although I've never quite understood "formaldehyde" because at that point, who the crap cares if you're preserved. I think one of the only 100% natural way to pass on this planet is rooted in Native American culture. They'd elevate the dead, laying them on wooden stands and let birds and other critters cycle you back into the food chain.
"I understand that this car is pretty expensive but it has more to it than any Ferrari can give to our earth and people." -- crystalcraze13, a ProU blogger
I suppose being put in the ground in a biodegradable container will also put you back into the food chain. Only it's critters in the ground, rather than the sky, that would do the work.
I want to eco the awesomeness of this post. Sweetness. I totally want a green burial now, but I feel strange being excited about my burial... I don't want to die yet, but I'm excited to go green one day!
Thanks for the info!
www.progressiveu.org/blog/americangirlinchina
I have heard of this, and while I full heartedly support it, I want to use this moment to promote donating organs and tissue after death. Green Funerals make sense, no one really cares how you look once you are below.
On that note, check out the site below. I had the pleasure one summer to make the acquaintance of one of the wife of one of these gentlemen. Perhaps I should email them about the future in green funerals?
http://www.vintagecoffins.com/
"Why should you care what people think?, You're dead"
"You only get one shot at the death thing, Don't let your friends and family screw it up."
I agree. People should consider organ donation... after all, they're not going to do us any good once we're dead. They could help someone else, though.
I looked at the Vintage Coffins site. It doesn't look like they do eco coffins and such, so I wonder what they think about natural burials and biodegradable coffins. They should join the movement! :)