By Bridget Wayland, Harrowsmith Country Life Magazine
You recycle. You carpool. You go organic. If you re an ecoconscious person, you try to minimize your impact on the planet every chance you get. How ironic, then, if all the virtuous principles you lived by get overturned in the end-the very end.
It may surprise you, but unless you specify otherwise in advance, your own burial could be an environmental nightmare. The alternative, a so-called “green’ burial, is really catching on, especially among environmentally aware baby boomers Harrowsmith readers among them-who have given the matter of their demise some thought.
The idea of an eco-funeral is one that involves less consumption, less waste and far less pollution than the typical option, which puts toxic formaldehyde, precious hardwood, metals and a whack of reinforced concrete into the earth, and treats your grave site to groundskeeping of the decidedly non-organic kind.
Steve Finnigan, a funeral director in Lacolle, a sleepy farming community in southwestern Quebec, has noticed an increasing demand for products which biodegrade more ecologically, such as natural, unvarnished wood caskets without any metal parts and paper-mache urns designed for water dispersal of the remains.
Opting out of embalming is a little trickier than buying an ecological coffin. “With modern refrigeration technology, its fine if you dorit want to be embalmed, but then the visitation must happen quickly,” says Finnigan, adding that it’s actually against the law to exhibit, non-embalmed body in a public place. such as a church.
Sally Meyer, the local United Church minister, adds that “it would be next to impossible to arrange for a church funeral within 24 hours, hence the option of cremation and a church service in the presence of your ashes. It’s the old ‘earth to earth, ashes to ashes, dust to dust.
At first glance, cremation does seem like a more earthfriendly option than embalming. Like most modem, natural-gas devices, the technology is becoming more efficient and cleanburning, but cremation still bums a non-renewable fossil fuel, produces greenhousegas emissions and, if your teeth are in rough shape, releases significant amounts of mercury vapour, which is toxic to fish.
But if embalming is out and cremation is no better, then what’s an environmentalist to do? If Mike Salisbury gets his way, there will soon be a greener option. Pioneer of the “natural burial” movement in Canada, the Guelph, Ontario-based landscape architect specializes in the design of eco-cemeteries, also called green burial grounds or woodland cemeteries, where environmental poisons are prohibited, lowimpact burials are the norm, and visitors feel like they’re in a nature preserve, albeit one with a spiritual side. They exist in the U.S. and in the U.K., but the Natural Burial Cooperative is currently seeking landowners and investors interested in developing eco-cemeteries here in Canada.
If the option were available now, you can be sure that Meyer would sign right up. Though she’s not even 5o yet, Meyer has already made her own funeral wishes clear. And they’re decidedly on the green side. “The family will have to mobilize quickly,” she says, “but it’s important to me. I try to leave a light footprint on the earth in my life, and I want to do the same thing in my death. I dotit want my funeral to negate everything that I stood for.”
Source - Harrowsmith Country Life Magazine April 2007