Page 13 - IAV Digital Magazine #475

iAV - Antelope Valley Digital Magazine
Washington Governor Signs Bill To Allow Composting Human Bodies
This week, Washington Governor Jay Inslee signed a bill to allow the composting of human remains within the state. It is the only state in the US—and possibly the only government in the world—to explicit- ly allow "natural organic reduction" of human remains.
The bill also legalizes alkaline hydrolysis, a base chemical process that also uses heat, pressure, and water to liquify remains. Bone is not liqui- fied in the
process, so it can be crushed and given to loved ones. Alkaline hydrolysis is legal in 19 other states, according to the New York Times.
The new law, which will take effect in May 2020, is a boon for Recompose, an organization that wants to offer composting as an alternative to green burials and cremation. Traditional burials usually require embalming chem- icals and caskets that will remain in the ground for centuries if not millennia. Green
burials, which forgo elaborate caskets and embalming chem- icals, still require some amount of land, which can be expensive, especially in urban areas. Cremation, on the other hand, requires a signifi- cant amount of energy (mostly from fossil fuels) to complete, releasing green- house gases in the process.
Recompose, on the other hand, hopes to serve people who want a less environ- mentally-taxing final rest.
Composting deceased live- stock is already practiced by some farmers, and Washington State University conducted a trial run of the process on human remains, using six bodies that had been donated for research purpos- es. The process took about four weeks to com- plete, and it creat- ed roughly one cubic yard of soil per person.
Recompose says that its reduction process for human remains will occur inside "reusable, hexag- onal recomposi- tion vessels."
"When the process has fin- ished, families will be able to take home some of the soil created, while gardens on-site will remind us that all of life is inter- connected," the organization says.
Bones and teeth are reduced in the process as well, as the envi-
ronment within the hexagonal pods is controlled to support microbes and bacteria that easi- ly break down tougher human matter. Much like with a backyard composting rig, the pods get mixed periodically to make sure the decomposition is even. Metal fill- ings, pacemak- ers, and artificial body parts are removed and recycled if possi- ble.
Katrina Spade, the founder of Recompose, told the Times that the process will cost about $5,000— more than a tradi- tional cremation, but less than a traditional burial. "The material we give back to fami- lies is much like the topsoil you'd buy at your local nursery," Recompose says on its website.
Although com- posting itself is not emissions- free, Recompose says it has con-
ducted a Life Cycle Assessment to compare conven- tional burial, cre- mation, natural burial, and recomposition. "In our preliminary findings, recom- position per- formed the best out of all four options in the majority of cate- gories," the orga- nization's website claims. Although there are few public studies on animal or human remains to con- firm Recompose's result, more gen- eral studies com- paring compost- ing to incineration of agricultural waste seem to support it.
"Thanks to the carbon sequestra- tion which occurs at different points throughout the recomposition process, we esti- mate that a metric ton of CO2 will be saved each time someone choos- es recomposition over cremation or conventional bur- ial," Recompose claims.
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