There are green buildings, green cars, even green weddings. Now comes one of the latest, and ultimately last moves, environmentally conscious consumers can make -- green burials.
Forgoing embalming, metal caskets and concrete burial vaults, green burials instead cover the body with a shroud, place it inside a biodegradable wooden or cardboard box and bury it in a woodland, where a new tree or a stone marks the grave. This natural approach, proponents say, is far less damaging to the Earth because it eliminates formaldehyde, a chemical used in embalming, as well as barriers that simply delay the body's inevitable decay. It is an approach that has been used for centuries by Jews and Muslims.
The practice of establishing woodland burial grounds, which began in the United Kingdom and in recent years has spread to California and other parts of the country, recently received a boost from Pittsburgh's Roy A. Hunt Foundation. It awarded a $5,000 grant to the Green Burial Council of Santa Fe, N.M., seeking to establish a national network of funeral homes to provide green burials.
Paul Henney, who operates funeral homes in Bethel Park, Mt. Lebanon and other area locations, is among those supporting green burials. He's the local contact for the Green Burial Council and said he would handle such arrangements for anyone interested.
Mr. Henney said he has received a "handful" of inquiries about green burials, "but right now, we don't have any cemeteries here providing these."
If someone wanted to be buried at a cemetery outside the region that does provide green burials, his company could help facilitate the effort. He also could obtain biodegradable caskets, which range from about $100 for a basic cardboard box to more than $3,000 for a handcrafted model.
It's possible that the region may soon have some green cemeteries.
The Catholic Cemeteries Association, which operates 15 active burial grounds in Western Pennsylvania, is considering setting aside land in four of its largest properties for green burials.
"We're open to the idea. We've had a few calls from a few people. I sense that interest is picking up a little," said Annabelle McGannon, executive director of the Catholic Cemeteries Association.
The association owns 1,000 acres of undeveloped land spread over its 15 active cemeteries, Ms. McGannon said, and association officials have discussed setting aside ground in four for green burials: Queen of Heaven in McMurray, Christ Our Redeemer in Ross, Resurrection Cemetery in Moon and Good Shepherd in Monroeville.
Part of the reason would simply be savings, she said. "It's very labor intensive to maintain a cemetery properly," Ms. McGannon said, noting that at least three-quarters of the association's annual budget goes to pay employees who maintain the burial grounds.
Not all cemeteries are ready for change.
"We are not in a position to do green burials," said Chuck Kelly, a sales representative at Allegheny Cemetery in Lawrenceville, who has received some inquiries about the practice.
"Mainly what the people are looking for is no casket and no embalming. They want to bring them in a sheet and do the burial,'' said Mr. Kelly, an industry veteran of 24 years. "We're not permitted to do that under our bylaws. Our burials require a vault."
Standards set by the state board of funeral directors in Pennsylvania say that human remains held for longer than 24 hours should be embalmed and sealed in a container that will not let odors escape, or be refrigerated. But there is no law in Pennsylvania that requires embalming, although directors in the state's 1,600 funeral homes do it routinely after obtaining permission from families.
Moreover, it's the policy of many funeral directors to embalm before a public visitation. The state funeral director standards also require that human remains shall be buried, cremated or entombed within five hours of removing a body from refrigeration.
Josh Slocum, executive director of the Vermont-based Funeral Consumers Alliance, a national group with 400,000 members that aims to educate consumers about cost and procedures involved in funerals, says green burial is "not just for Californians anymore" and exemplifies "good old-fashioned Yankee simplicity and frugality.
"It can be inexpensive. It's not wasteful of money or resources. ... It's not about the beautiful casket. It's about the family participating in an important life passage," Mr. Slocum said.
Joe Sehee, founder of the Green Burial Council, contends green burials are a way for funeral directors to reconnect with families who have avoided funeral homes by taking a body directly to a crematoria.
When Jessica Mitford published her scathing book, "The American Way of Death," in 1963, Mr. Sehee said, she "put cremation on the map. That's the way you circumvent the death merchant.
"The funeral industry is either going to respond or lose this [the green burial] business."
Mr. Sehee believes green burials reduce the amount of waste involved in conventional funerals and, with the proper planning, will conserve land that would otherwise be developed.
Mr. Sehee regularly urges funeral directors, who began losing business to crematories in the 1960s, to offer the service. (According to the Funeral Consumers Alliance, the average American funeral costs $6,600 while a cremation without a funeral, known in the industry as "direct disposition," is well under $1,000.)
"Ninety percent of the people who are attracted to green burial otherwise are going to do a direct cremation. You are going to make more money ... facilitating a green burial," Mr. Sehee said.
Ramsey Creek, the first woodland burial ground in the United States, opened in 1998 in Westminster, S.C., on 40 acres of farmland once used to grow cotton. Visitors to Ramsey Creek can walk trails through the land and may not even notice the graves.
The closest woodland burial ground to Pennsylvania is Greensprings, outside of Ithaca, N.Y. There are woodland burial grounds in California, Texas and Florida.
Frank Ashbaugh, vice president of Pittsburgh's chapter of the Funeral Consumers Alliance, recently wrote letters to 21 local cemeteries to see if any of them offered green burials. He received no response. In follow-up phone calls to 11 cemeteries, Mr. Ashbaugh learned that none of the cemeteries were interested in providing "green burials."
William Howard, vice president of sales for Homewood Cemetery in the East End of Pittsburgh, said a portion of land in a 50-acre swath of the cemetery near Frick Park could possibly be used for green burials.
"You don't have to be embalmed, and you don't need a vault. I do believe it's something we should consider. I think a lot of people would prefer that type of burial," Mr. Howard said. "You should have something for everyone."
Such a change would require approval by the cemetery's board of trustees and board of incorporators.
John Eirkson, director of the state funeral directors association in Harrisburg, said he does not see a "huge groundswell for this in Pennsylvania.
"Is this going to take off in Pittsburgh? I don't think Pittsburgh's California. Change comes slowly here, whether it's in the legislature or whether it's in funerals."
First Published: January 30, 2008, 10:00 a.m.
