What is a Green Burial?
The goal of a green, or natural, burial is to return the body to the earth in a manner that does not inhibit decomposition and allows the body to return to dust naturally. It is an environmentally sustainable alternative to burying chemicals, concrete, plastics, metals and precious woods in the ground.
In 1993 the modern idea of green burial really took hold in the UK. Since then the concept has spread across the globe.
What is common with green burial?
- No embalming
- Use a natural casket (or shroud)
- No vault
- Burial is in an area with native trees, shrubs and flowers, with no man-made additions
- Burial is more shallow than a traditional funeral to facilitate decomposition
- Grave markers are those that do not intrude on the landscape
- As in all cemeteries, a record is still kept of exact location of each burial (typically using global positioning coordinates)
- In Utah only a few commercial cemeteries allow Green Burial. However if you want to dig the grave yourself or avoid a vault, a rural cemetery may allow you to. Also you can bury on your own rural private property (paying attention to local ordinances governing such). For a list of rural cemeteries in Utah: history.utah.gov/research_and_collections/cemeteries/index.html
Environmental Issues with Conventional Burial
Each year, over 22,000 cemeteries across the United States bury approximately:
- 30 million board feet of hardwoods (in caskets)
- 90,000 tons of steel (in caskets)
- 14,000 tons of steel (in vaults)
- 2,700 tons of copper and bronze (in caskets)
- 1,600,000 tons of reinforced concrete (in vaults)
- 825,000 US gallons of embalming fluid (include mostly formaldehyde)
Links to more about Natural Burial
- Green Burials.org
- For a statewide City Cemetery Survey of prices and rules, email: FCAofUtah@gmail.com
- http://www.landscapeonline.com/research/article.php?id=4054
- The Centre for Natural Burial
- Funeral Consumers Alliance FAQ on Green Burial
- Dead Bodies and Disease: The "Danger" That Doesn't Exist
- www.pleasantgreen.net This is a cemetery on the foothills just south of the Great Salt Lake that encourages simple inexpensive burial
Pictures of Natural Caskets
Did you know that if your loved one is over 300 lbs you will be pressured to buy a costly oversized casket and subsequently an oversized vault too! Consider what Robert Alexander of Far West Utah has created: These gorgeous casket for bodies weighing more that 300lbs (500 lbs pictured) AND it fits in a standard cemetery vault!!
Caskets by Robert Alexander 801-388-9158 Email: rwalexander@juno.com
