The Greenwash Brigade
Ecopods are burying the greenwash
Did you ever hear that joke -- that the quickest way to significantly reduce your environmental footprint is to die?
However, while death is a natural part of ecosystems, with dead organisms consumed by other organisms (waste equals food), dead humans are typically embalmed with a toxic cocktail of chemicals and then entombed in nesting boxes of concrete, plastic, and precious hardwoods.
Marketplace ran a story about an 'eco-friendly' coffin producer in the UK who is producing recycled paper coffins to reduce the environmental impact of funerals. While the coffin is indeed part of the story, shipping a $3,000 (recycled) coffin 5,000+ miles to reduce a burial's environmental impact feels a bit like selecting the rapidly-renewable bamboo trim package to reduce the environmental impact of your hummer.
The embalming fluid is the elephant in the room. It is estimated that over 800,000 gallons of formaldehyde-containing embalming fluid are buried each year in the US.
Green Burials, or Natural Burials, offer the opportunity of preparing the body without toxic embalming fluids. Refrigeration is typically substituted to slow the decomposition process, with the body then buried in a biodegradable casket or simple shroud, and typically interred in a natural burial site serving as a wildlife preserve. Home funerals, which often use dry ice to preserve the body for viewing, offer an opportunity to further reduce impacts and personalize the experience.
The Green Burial Council has developed standards for Conservation Burial Grounds and Natural Burial Grounds, as well as a directory of green burial providers and resources about the environmental impacts of burials.
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Meet the Greenwash Brigade
Our hand-picked environmental professionals, each part of the Public Insight Network, are on the hunt for "greenwash" as they examine eco-friendly claims by companies, governments and other groups. They ask tough questions about the mainstreaming of green, from the perspectives of people in the trenches who are focused on these issues 24/7.
Jim Nicolow is a nationally recognized expert on sustainable design and leads the sustainability initiative for Lord, Aeck & Sargent, overseeing the incorporation of sustainable design strategies and features into the firm’s design projects. He is a LEED® Accredited Professional with extensive knowledge of the U.S. Green Building Council’s (USGBC) LEED rating system.
Janne K. Flisrand has worked as an affordable housing and urban planning research consultant for five years, primarily supporting local non-profits. Her focus is on transit, transit-oriented design, affordable housing, and sustainability. Currently, she’s the program coordinator for Minnesota Green Communities, a program promoting affordable, healthy, sustainably built housing throughout Minnesota.
Dennis Markatos-Soriano co-founded SURGE (Students United for a Responsible Global Environment), which aims to bring young progressives together across issues of environmental and social justice throughout North Carolina and beyond. In the summer of 2006, he helped to start a small green company, Greenway Pedicabs, to provide a greenhouse gas-free transportation option for people in the Triangle of North Carolina. He is currently pursuing a Master's in Public Affairs at Princeton University's Woodrow Wilson School.
Heidi Siegelbaum is president of Siegelbaum & Associates, which specializes in science translation, cross-border indicators with Canada, cross-disciplinary planning and environmental technical assistance to businesses. Increasingly, her focus is on sustainable tourism and green hotels. Previously, she was in-house legal counsel for EPA for industrial chemicals and biotechnology and the senior performance measure analyst for the Washington State Department of Ecology. She is on the executive committee of the Northwest Natural Resource Group, which brokers FSC forest certification and landowner business services.
NOTE: The opinions expressed by the Greenwash Brigade bloggers and those providing comments are theirs alone, and do not reflect the opinions of American Public Media or its employees. American Public Media is not responsible for the accuracy of any of the information supplied by the Greenwash Brigade bloggers.
Previously
- It's not just salmon: take a fresh look at our fishing & eating habits
- Does green travel offset emissions.... or just your guilt?
- Greenwashing is a gateway drug
- Baking soda is all you need to make your own green cleaning products
- Ecopods are burying the greenwash
- Green homes - speedy sales in a slow market?
- Climate-friendly investing... with nuclear?
- Biofuels' virgin flight an important step
- It doesn't take a porta-potty!
- Burt's Bees takes on cosmetics
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Comments (7)
Interesting concept. What about cremation?
My much-loved 97-year-old grandma passed away a couple months ago, and it has me thinking about what I hope will happen to me. Jim gave the description (refrigeration, no embalming, an organic sheet shroud preferably found in my home and not purchased new, plant a tree over me, get rid of my stuff on Freecycle).
Lacking a death wish, having good genes, and barring a freak accident, I've been hoping that by the time it matters green burials will be familiar and less resisted by The Burial Industry.
My plan doesn't much matter if I'm not here to make it happen. I don't know about anyone else, but my family doesn't spend much time talking about last wishes, and I'm young enough that making my own arrangements seems macabre.
So – what do I do to pave the way... just in case? Leave fliers about the legality of not-embalming and using shrouds around for my parents to find? (Would they think I was making suggestions for them?) Send them a link to this post?
In theory, cremation could allow you to avoid embalming. However in practice, it seems that bodies are generally embalmed prior to cremation.
I've considered cremation, but after a little research, I realized it uses so much energy that I can't justify it.
RE Embalming:
1) Embalming is not required by law. There is a time-requirement for artificial preservation in many states, however. Refrigeration, dry ice, or even 'nothing' at all can be perfectly adequate.
2) Formaldehyde-free embalming fluid has been available from the third largest embalming fluid company in the US for over 15 years. It uses a less toxic (an irritant - gluteraldehyde - as opposed to a carcinogen - formaldehyde) substance as its active ingredient. Formaldehyde is a known carcinogen and harms embalmers, makers, and any natural environments in which it comes into contact in concentrated form.
Recognizing its toxicity, hospitals replaced formaldehyde products with gluteraldehyde-based sanitizing chemistry back in the 60's. The fact that embalming is still perceived to be required by law, and that it's still perceived as needing formaldehyde to accomplish the result, is a myth that's been available to uncover for years.
Thanks to the internet, that myth can now be busted once and for all.
3) A completely non-toxic - no MSDS - embalming product that replicates the preservation task of contemporary embalming (not the Aardbalm product, btw) has been formulated in the US and will be available early 2009. Funeral homes who wish to use the non-toxic plant-based products need to transition through the gluteraldehyde since the process/result of embalming without formaldehyde is quite different than what takes place with formaldehyde-free operations and embalmers will need to adjust their techniques accordingly. Green funeral directors around the country are beginning the shift to gluteraldehyde now.
4) 20% of all deaths happen non-locally and still require some form of embalming, mythology around the law not-withstanding (the myths ensure the rest of the bodies all get embalmed, no matter what). An individual preference for no-embalming by the natural burial community (and I'm in this camp, personally) should not end up forcing everyone else who believes they want embalming to use the most toxic substance available in order to get it.
Having a non-toxic embalming fluid will make it possible for a lot of folks, forced into embalming for practical means or simply having that be the choice of their parents or loved ones, to at least opt for toxic-reduction in the workplace (now, with the gluteraldehyde) or non-toxic embalming (next year, as soon as the non-toxic product is released).
Once again, putting more natural choices out there that populate the continuum of options in the old-style funeral industry that allow the leading edge (the top 5%-10%, perhaps?) of the marketplace to adjust as it can, is extremely important in the earliest stages of this revolution in how we conduct our technologies at the end of our lives.
Thanks for offering the information to folks. Thanks for continuing to do the research necessary to have the knowledge to reply to your commenters with the support making good choices requires. It's a very new topic, and not a lot is publicly known yet.
in trees,
Cynthia
Thanks for your informed, thoughtful response, Cynthia.
EcoGeek just ran a story about liquification as 'greenest way to die', having a carbon footprint 18 times less than cremation: http://www.ecogeek.org/content/view/1529/85/
Excerpt: "When the body has been fully liquefied, it has been separated into two main parts. The first is a bio-fluid that is basically a collection of all our building blocks: Salts, sugars, peptides, and amino acids. The nutrients in this liquid are still entirely intact and can be returned to the soil to help our plants grow. The second is basically a "shadow" of your bones called bone ash, pure calcium phosphate. This can be used in horticulture, ceramics, and even as a raising agent! In other words, getting resomated allows you to fully return your body to the Earth without worrying about adding a bunch of unwanted stuff to the soil at the same time."