'Aquamation': What's in a name?

'Creepy' Alkaline Hydrolysis

The news was a-buzz today (at least in Australia) with the story of a new green disposition alternative- Aquamation.  No longer will families have only burial and cremation to choose from.  This new method keeps the mercury from amalgam dental fillings from polluting the atmosphere, and has a very low carbon footprint.  

This is quite an innovation!  The process?  Well, no - the process was developed some time ago at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota, and has been used there for years.  True, it was a great innovation at the time, called Resomation, or worse, Alkaline Hydrolysis!, it has made little headway so far, despite its obvious environmental benefits and green bona-fides.  The process, though approved by moral arbiters, was considered unpleasant to think about, and prone to being made fun of in the press as 'sending your loved one down the drain'.  In a culture fixated on being 'natural' it looked too much like a creepy industrial 'solution'.  

'Feeling good' Aquamation

.

The innovation in this case is the word- Aquamation.  Doesn't this conjure a picture of the natural, timeless power of the ocean?  Provided with a word like this, the news agencies are taking a new tack, and giving a lot of favorable publicity to the process.  It's a feel-good story, not a creep-out story.  I'm glad Australian resomators found a good PR firm before they sent out their press releases,  because as dim a picture as this paints of us as discerning consumers, it paints a very bright one for those of us who would like to see more sustainable options in death.


For more information about green disposition options, visit:

Promession: A Return to the Living Soil

Swedish town Considers Recycling the Heat of Cremation
The Shrouded Way: Emissions and Dehumanization
The Trees Remember: Memorial Plantings
Forest Burial in Germany

Coming soon to a funeral home near you?

Promessa Organic of Sweden developed a new form of disposition called promation. This is most likely the greenest of green funeral options to come along, truly returning a body to the earth in an ecologically positive manner. Look for an interview with the woman behind this process, Susanne Wiigh-Mäsak, here in the coming weeks.

visit her site at http://www.promessa.se/ .