Human Composting: Living Green Even in the Afterlife

There are several “death” days on the Weird Holidays & Observances page, such as Plan Your Epitaph Day, which is observed on both April 6 and November 2, and Cremation Day, which is observed on December 9. Not that human composting is cremation, but it is a similar, yet more eco-friendly, alternative.

But what is human composting, and how do you do it? Is it even legal? Let’s explore this way of going green even in the afterlife.

About Human Composting

Even if you’re not a gardener, you’re probably at least familiar with the idea of composting. I liked the way Luxury Landscape succinctly summed it up, “The point of compost is to nourish your soil to provide a healthy habitat in which your grass, plants, and trees can thrive.”

That’s pretty much the purpose of human composting too. As Recompose, a green funeral home in Seattle, explains on their site, they use “a process called natural organic reduction to transform human remains into soil.”

They use 8 feet long 4 feet tall steel cylinders for their composting. Bodies decompose atop a bed of wood chips, alfalfa, and straw in the “vessels.”

A CNN article about it said that once the process is complete, relatives and loved ones receive some of the soil while the rest is donated to conservation land.

Wait, what? Loved ones don’t get to keep all of the soil? We’ll explore more about that in the cons of the process below.

The Benefits of Human Composting

Cremation is often less expensive than a burial, and I always assumed it was more environmentally friendly too. Apparently not. As CNN reported, “Cremations require lots of fuel —cremating one corpse emits an estimated 418 pounds of carbon dioxide into the air, the equivalent of driving 470 miles in a car.”

They also listed a stat from Green Burial Council Inc. that “cremations account for 1.74 billion pounds of carbon dioxide emissions each year.” And that’s just in the U.S. alone.

But human composting can reduce those emissions while putting bodies to good use.

The Cons of Human Composting

While it can reduce greenhouse gas emissions, there are some cons too. For one, it’s not a quick process, as you might imagine. It can take up to 120 days to compost a body. That makes space a problem. And if demand for the service grew, well…basic economics, right? The more people who want it without enough vessels to go around leads to a supply and demand issue that could raise prices.

Another problem is that not every person is a candidate. As CNN reported, “Natural organic reduction destroys most harmful pathogens, but there are three rare diseases that disqualify a body from undergoing human composting.” They are ebola, tuberculosis, and “diseases caused by prions, which are abnormal, transmissible pathogenic agents that can cause abnormal folding of certain brain proteins.”

An even bigger problem is that human composting isn’t legal in most states. Washington was the first to legalize it in 2019. Oregon, Vermont, and Colorado were next. California recently passed a bill approving it, which goes into effect in 2027. New York recently passed a bill, too, and lawmakers in Massachusetts are working on getting one passed there as well.

And remember how I mentioned only some of the soil is returned to families? Well, the amount depends on state laws. As CNN pointed out, “the soil would still be legally considered human remains with regulations on what people can do with them.”

But mostly, right now, human composting isn’t practical on a large scale, which may inhibit its widespread use.

A Tour of Recompose

Caitlin Doughty from Ask a Mortician took a tour of Recompose, which she shared on her YouTube channel. I’ve embedded it here if you’re curious to check it out.

Check-In

Would you consider human composting as an alternative to burial or cremation?