What Are Your Eco-Friendly Burial Options?

If you love the environment, your eco-friendly activism doesn’t have to end when your life does. In fact, there are green burial options that are a lot better for the planet than traditional burials. Natural burials give green individuals the option to fight for their beliefs in life and in death.

Are you interested in learning more about an eco-friendly burial? If so, take a look at these options below:

Mushroom Burial

One of the natural burials that most people are unfamiliar with is mushroom burials. Mushrooms are naturally designed to devour decomposing human tissue. The human body is full of toxins that are resubmitted into the atmosphere during cremation and other types of body disposal.

However, mushrooms can absorb and purify those toxins through a process known as mycoremediation. Inevitably, this process leaves the planet cleaner than it was before.

Once the mushrooms break the tissue down, they transfer nutrients from the body into the fungi within the soil and pass the sustenance to the trees.

If you wish to have a green burial and keep hazardous chemicals out of the atmosphere, this is one of the best ways to do so.

Sky Burial

Many Buddhists in Tibet practice a natural burial known as sky burial. They transport the body to charnel grounds where vultures eat the flesh. The belief is that doing this offers the body back to the Earth and helps the dead move to the next life. 

Although this is more of a ritualistic type of burial, it’s still better for the environment. If you are someone who enjoys the outdoors or feels a connection to nature and the planet, then a sky burial is a good option.

Aquamation

Aquamation is referred to as water cremation or alkaline hydrolysis. During this process, the body is put into a stainless steel container that’s filled with 95% water and 5% potassium hydroxide. The mixture of alkaline waters and 350°F temperatures make the body dissolve.

Aquamation does the same thing to the body as if it would have been left in nature—either on soil or in water.

However, a natural occurrence takes a few months to dissolve the body. But this process takes 20 hours in an aquamation pod. 

By the time the process is over, the only thing that’s left is a skeleton, which is ground into a white powder and given to loved ones.

Green Burial

Green burials are much like the traditional kind. However, there are a few differences. It doesn’t involve embalming or hazardous chemicals of any sort. Most of the time the graves are dug by hand, and there is no cement plot. 

Individuals who choose a green burial only use biodegradable caskets, and the body is wrapped within an unbleached cloth shroud. This type of burial allows the corpse to naturally decompose and return to Earth.

In addition to green burials, there’s also a burial process known as green cremation. To inquire about it, click the highlighted link.

Body Farms

Your contribution to society through your burial doesn’t always have to be about the environment. Body farms are used by forensic anthropologists so they can study body decomposition. The farms help to develop criminal science through the study of death and create many new approaches to solving homicides and other cases. 

One of the discoveries that came from body farms included the microbiome clock. It’s a process that determines the exact time of death by reviewing the posthumous microbiome.

These sorts of findings are a big deal for scientists and detectives. Numerous people donate their bodies to body farms to help further research within the criminal investigation field.

Sea Burial

Sea burial is an eco-friendly burial that has been used by naval personnel, pirates, and even the Vikings. It allows individuals who love the ocean to return to it in their death. Some sea burials involve dropping a modified casket into the water, while others use natural burial shrouds.

During a sea burial, a charter takes the funeral party out on the water and provides either an open or closed casket service. Once the words have been spoken, the body is then dropped into the sea.

 This type of barrier isn’t everyone’s style, but for those who love the water, it’s the perfect ending.

Recomposition

Another eco-friendly burial option is recomposition or body composting. At the moment, this type of burial isn’t legal everywhere. But on most farmlands, farmers have used this method for their livestock for many years. They use wood chips, moisture, and wind breezes to speed up the natural process of decay. It helps to create nutrient-rich soil.

Once this type of burial practice is legal, it’ll allow families to put their loved one’s shrouded corpses into a recomposing vessel, then cover it with wood chips. Within a month they’ll be able to gather their remains and use them in their home gardens as compost.

Prepare for an Eco-Friendly Burial

The truth is, we all have to go one day. If the environment is important to you, it’s essential that you have discussions with your family and friends so that they know exactly how you want to be buried.

An eco-friendly burial will make your loved ones feel connected to you. They’ll know that they are honoring your wishes and sending you off in a way that would make you happy.

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