Seattle Designer Suggests Composting The Deceased

  • 10 years ago
A designer from Seattle has come up with a way that bodies can be laid to rest in a way that makes them beneficial to the environment.

Not only do people create a lot of landfill while they’re alive, they can also cause a bit of an ecological issue once they’re deceased.

A designer from Seattle has come up with a way that bodies can be laid to rest in a way that makes them beneficial to the environment.

Katrina Spade has started a company that will compost people’s dearly departed rather than burying them or having them cremated.

The problem with mainstream handling of the dead is that they result in a large carbon footprint.

Reportedly, US coffin manufacturers use over 4 million acres of trees a year, embalming delays corpses from decaying naturally, and cremation requires a lot of fossil fuels.

Further, all of those headstones, mausoleums, and burial grounds claim about a million acres of US land.

Spade’s plan, called the Urban Death Project, involves the aerobic decomposition of a corpse, after which it is turned into a soil-enriching ready material.

Friends and family can take the compost for their own use. The community is also welcome to take it.

Funerary services are part of the Urban Death Project experience and include viewing opportunities during the laying in. Would you choose this type of burial?

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