The predominate funeral, casket and cemetery industry buries 90,000 tons of steel caskets and 17,000 tons of steel and copper vaults as well as 1.6 million tons of reinforced concrete in the ground every year, along with 800,000 gallons of formaldehyde. Cremation is less toxic, but still releases carcinogens in the air.

There are approximately 250 woodland burial sites in the U.K., and around 25 in the U.S.

The Green Burial Council is an independent nonprofit organization founded to encourage ethical and environmentally sustainable death care practices, and to use the burial process as a means of facilitating the acquisition, restoration and stewardship of natural areas.

Green Burials & Home Funerals

Green Burials

For those who endeavor to leave a small environmental footprint on the earth a green burial would reflect how they lived their life. The body is wrapped in a biodegradable shroud or casket, and buried in direct contact with the earth, with a native tree, plant or stone to mark their grave. Green cemeteries do not have lawns, headstones or markers in tidy rows, but are kept as natural as possible, often resembling a nature preserve in a woodland setting. Indeed, in England green cemeteries are often called Woodland Cemeteries. As a final act of life, the opportunity to be a part of a land or nature conservation gives many people’s life and death meaning, through loving preserving land for future generations. Due to the current dearth of green cemeteries, this is unfortunately an expensive option.

Home Funerals

Home funerals were once the norm, with the deceased prepared by the family and friends for viewing in the family parlor. Today, a family member with the right to disposition of the body can legally act as funeral director, transport the body and fill out the legal paperwork. Although this choice may not be for everyone, home funerals allow family members to clean, dress and caress their loved-one, grieve at their own pace and provide a therapeutic letting go of the body. Having simple, dignified home services offers families an appropriate alternative for their own particular needs, is inexpensive, and allows families to participate in end of life rituals. Since bodies are typically preserved with dry ice, home funerals do not use formaldehyde and embalming and are therefore ecologically sound. Farewell Assistance can supply support through education, direction and consulting, in order to foster confidence in the family members who care for the body.

Let children walk with nature, let them see the beautiful blendings and communions of death and life...and they will learn that death is stingless indeed and as beautiful as life.

~ John Muir

Persons who choose to handle death privately must take great care to follow all state and local regulations.

~ Lisa Carlson, Caring for the Dead, your final act of love

"When I am asked why I chose to bury my mother myself, I wonder why anyone would choose to have someone else care for a loved one’s body. We fear death, so therefore we let others handle it – only to rob ourselves of the experience that will help comfort our hearts."

~ Jan Burhman Osnoss, quoted in Caring for the Dead, your final act of love

Jerrigrace Lyons founded Final Passages as a result of the unexpected death of her friend Carolyn Whiting. Because of Carolyn's interest in a natural and conscious approach to death care, she left detailed instructions for a home funeral. This most personal, meaningful and respectful experience awakened in her a passion to share it with others.

Having imagined, as most parents do, that she could never endure the catastrophe of a child's death, Knox found that "when it actually happened, my senses were so highly attuned to the sense of love, I had a very precise presence of mind, very clear sense of direction." There is, she said, "a lot of comfort in being able to perform acts of love in these unbearable situations."

~ Beth Knox, founder of Crossings, quoted in the Washington Post