Eco (Green) funerals

Green burial, sometimes known as Natural burial or Woodland burial is a rapidly growing alternative funeral choice with over 220 sites being developed nationwide since 1994. It provides a much more environmentally friendly burial option than cremation, which creates air pollution whilst using up precious fossil fuels. Moreover, by planting a tree instead of a headstone, an eco funeral actually helps to mop up surplus carbon in the atmosphere.

It allows greater choice and participation for family and friends. This has been proved to help those involved come to terms with the grieving process more fully.

Since they first started taking place in Britain roughly ten years ago, the popularity of green funerals has grown enormously, and today they are the most requested alternative to conventional burial. Whilst there is no strict definition of what constitutes an eco-burial, the main distinction places an onus on using carbon-friendly materials and methods wherever possible. Experts at the Natural Death Centre, a charity that supports those trying to arrange inexpensive, family organised and environmentally-friendly funerals, has predicted that 20,000 people in Britain will be buried in a green way by 2010 (the number is currently around 11,000).

Why opt for a green funeral? For a start, conventional burials generate an astonishing CO2 footprint: they tend to include MDF or hardwood coffins with plastic (non-biodegradable) handles, lined with synthetic material, topped off with an “air-mile heavy” granite headstone quarried, almost inevitably, in China. Embalming processes commonly use formaldehyde which leaks into the soil, making most graveyards toxic waste grounds that are inhospitable to local wildlife.

The prospect of a cardboard coffin may fill some with horror, but eco-coffins have come a long way since their rudimentary beginnings. The current trend is to hand paint a cardboard coffin, or, a little more peculiarly,
to Photoshop images of the deceased onto it.

Eco-burials can take place in traditional graveyards; however, those wanting a truly green ending often choose to be buried in one of the Britain’s natural burial sites this country has over 200 of them, mainly woodlands and meadows. The majority do not allow headstones, instead encouraging the planting of a tree as a living memorial, or a small wooden grave marker. And the effect of this restriction, in the site I visited with Dianne,
is surprisingly poignant. Compared to a single white ribbon tied to a tree branch, or a line of smooth, round pebbles arranged in a simple circle, a traditional granite gravestone seems almost brutal. Whether or not you care about your carbon footprint after you’re dead and gone, at the very least an eco-burial can be a philosophical choice conveying a sense of peaceful humility in the face of our inevitable mortality.