Clearly at the macrocosmic level, multinational corporations and rising first-tier nations with large energy appetites are proliferators of environmental toxins. But at the microcosmic level, we, as individuals, are also unfortunate participants in the global crisis.

Consider: The American way of dying. If Jessica Mitford's wry 1963 bestseller The American Way of Death was an eye-opening expose of the funeral industry's Plutonian efforts at parting the bereaved from their hard-earned cash, then yesterday's AP article about eco-friendly funerals - replete with funereal clothing sewn from natural fibers, biodegradable coffins and a natural-setting burial plot - was a fascinating new take on that most inconvenient of rituals.

When plotting the ultimate exit strategy, Green Funerals, or, as they are also known, "Natural Burials," are more and more becoming an acceptable option, especially for socially-conscious Boomers. Metal caskets and chemical embalming are not particularly friendly to the environment. "In 15 years natural burial has become one of the fastest growing eco movements in the UK," Mike Jarvis, director of the Natural Death Centre, told The Guardian.

New South Wales, Australia's most populous state, is getting its first eco-burial site on July 1st. According to Simon Webster of SMH.com, "the deceased will be buried in biodegradable coffins between gum trees in a protected koala sanctuary." Families will be able to pick a burial site in the bush land attachment to Lismore Memorial Park Cemetery in the Northern Rivers region. Headstones are to be made of natural rock, and biodegradable coffins are made of plantation pine, recycled cardboard or woven wicker. And green burials are comparatively cheap, in the $250-$3,000 range as opposed to the average funeral, whose headstones alone can cost several thousand dollars.

As someone who attended an eco-friendly New England college festooned with orchards, it was not entirely unusual to hear people talking about wanting to be buried under an apple or a cherry tree. But to have the environment figure into the funereal equation and to have it discussed so openly in the newspapers as an emerging trend is somewhat heartening, especially considering the expanding global population and increasingly finite planetary space.
[Image: shiftmag]