Eco-cemetery -how many of you would do this?

Question

An eco-cemetery also known as a green burial ground, or a natural burial preserve, is a cemetery where the body is returned to the earth to decompose and recycle naturally, is an environmentally sustainable alternative to existing funeral practices.

This is what I want...I think it would be so much better for the Earth!

Wikipedia- has a lot of info on this just type in ECO- Cemetary.

to Jess- yes it is safe it is actually the best thing you could do for the earth- yes it is deep enough and we are food for all the life under the ground and the ecosystem.

I am weary of donating my body for medical research since i don't egree with the way they profit from the use of your body- so I would be very careful of who I donated to.

I have researched the many ways poeple are buried and the different ways different cultures do it- plus I just like the idea of being put in the earth it only seems natural.

Many States have Natural burial preserves
Ramsey Creek Nature Preserve
Trust For Natural Legacies
Prairie Wilderness Cemetery
Greensprings Natural Cemetery
Glendale Nature Preserve
Natural Burial Co-operative
Retrieved from "http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eco-cemetery"
and they are gaining a lot of popularity.



Each year, 22,500 cemeteries across the United States bury approximately:

30 million board feet (70,000 m³) of hardwoods (caskets)
90,272 tons of steel (caskets)
14,000 tons of steel (vaults)
2,700 tons of copper and bronze (caskets)
1,636,000 tons of reinforced concrete (vaults)
827,060 US gallons (3,130 m³) of embalming fluid, which most commonly includes formaldehyde. However it is worth noting that embalming fluid chemically changes in the act of preserving the body and is not largely present as a fluid and this figure refers to embalming fluid before it is introduced to the body.

Answer 1

I think that this makes a lot of sense because we use too many valuable resources to bury our "shell". Once you are dead, all that's left is going to turn to dust anyway. Why do you want to keep taking up space for millennia?? We respect the dead by honoring their memory, and not the flesh that they leave behind.

Answer 2

This has been my first choice ever since I read about it -- long before 6 Feet Under made it more widely known. If it's available, I want it. Cremation is second choice. I find our culture's manner of dealing with death and dying to be unrealistic, and the funeral industry to be disgusting. Really -- spend THOUSANDS of dollars to bury someone? I'd rather my children used that money in a life enhancing manner. I've said for years -- if you feel compelled to have some sort of memorial for me, then plant a tree. There can never be too many trees.

Answer 3

My question would be how deep do they bury the bodies? In most cemeteries, the vault and casket was developed to keep the remains in the ground. It's not unknown for the wood to rise, and sometimes for the bones to surface, so who maintains this eco-cemetery? And what if family members object to Grandpa 'recycling'? Is it good for the water table and the local flora and fauna?
I wouldn't do it.

Answer 4

This is almost how I've always wanted it...ideally, I'd just be sat out under a tree, but that's impractical for many reasons.

Last time I researched this, Texas allows burial of unembalmed bodies only if buried within 24 hours of death. So you'd have to have done all the spadework (sorry!) ahead of time.

Answer 5

Yes. No question at all. I don' t want to be enbalmed and stuck in a metal casket with a pound of undertaker makeup on... I'd rather be cremated. So the eco-cemetery seems like the right choice. Dust unto dust.

Answer 6

Yes I want to be buried sitting upright in a 2 meter hole,with a bale of hay on top of me, to speed up the decomposition,with out a coffin,and with a Jacaranda planted on top of me.(this is a personal choice because blue is my sacred color)but in general I would suggest fruit trees.

This is legal all over the world ,as long as the buriel is recorded by an oficial of the municipality
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If everybody did that we would create sacred Forrest's ,instead of cemeteries full of concrete crosses on top of concrete slabs ,encased in murdered trees.
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in Mexico 100 million people will automatically deforest 20.000 hectares of dense Forrest, just because they die their deaths killing thousands of trees at the same time,

And in the process break the second law of Nature,which is the Law of return,which states the dead shall be food for the living.to complete the cycle of life.

Christians lie and offend Gaia by saying dust to dust and not doing it,they bury their dead in zinc lined boxes preventing the corpse from returning to other life forms ,and breaking the cycle .For which they will be duly damned

Answer 7

Check out the book, Grave Matters. You can see it on amazon. There is a green burial movement in Great Britain, but it sounds very different than allowing one's body to remerge with nature.

Answer 8

This would be an excellent idea IF it was legal, which in some states/cities, it is not legal to bury a person without a vault or protective covering.

Before making a decision check the laws where you want to be buried.

Answer 9

I would definitely choose this type of burial over the standard burial ... if I were going to be buried.

My plan is to give my body to a medical school. I have no intention of taking up space.

Answer 10

I have to admit that the idea of animals and bugs crawling through me and eating me grosses me out! Even though I know it's a better option environmentally to become compost, I'm going to have to go with cremation. There's also a lot of mythology about purification through fire, which I find fitting.