An Environmentally Friendly Burial Option

If you prefer walking through a forest rather than a cemetery, and the thought of lying in a coffin under a gravestone for all eternity gives you the creeps, take note.

An Italian company is developing a green burial option that turns your body into a tree.

Current burial practices can be an environmental nightmare. Heavy caskets buried cemented burial vaults use a tremendous amount of resources. Maintaining cemeteries requires water, fertilizer, and herbicides. Embalming chemicals can leach into the air and soil, polluting the environment.

Even cremation, which most see is a more environmentally friendly option, results in dangerous pollutants being released into the atmosphere.

Capsula Mundi aims to reach environmentally conscious people foregoing modern burials in favor of earth-friendly options. It plans to create biodegradable, egg-shaped burial pods made from potato and corn starch.

Corpses would be placed within the pods and draped in a cloth of natural fibers. Once buried, a tree of the deceased person’s choosing can be planted on top of the pod so that the decomposing body can provide nourishment for the tree.

The project is still in a start-up phase, but you can keep up with it on Capsula Mundi’s website.