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...Just Flush Those Corpses Down The Drain!?
07/11/10 03:22, by OGRE / (Jeff), Categories: Welcome, News, In real life, History, Politics, Strange_News Environmentalism has reached a new low. Just when you thought the Eco-Nuts had gone too far; now there's a company in Belgium that offers to have your loved one "dissolved" instead of buried or cremated.
Resomator S750Under the process, known as resomation, bodies are treated in a steel chamber with potassium hydroxide at high pressure and a temperature of 180c (350f).
The raised pressure and temperature means the body reaches a similar end point as in standard cremation — just bones left to be crushed up — in two to three hours.
Six states in America have passed legislation to allow resomation and the Scottish company behind the technology says it is in talks to allow the process in the UK.
Although the ashes can be recycled in waste systems, the residue from the process can also be put in urns and handed over to relatives of the dead like normal ashes from crematorium farewells.
Resomation Ltd was formed in east Glasgow in 2007 and has been in talks with the UK government about using the technology in Britain.
To think that cremation is causing a negative environmental is ridiculous. People have been burned for thousands of years and now, for some reason, it's a problem? What other institution is the next to be attacked in the name of the environment?
People are free to do whatever they want with their deceased loved ones; however, I think that it's a little creepy to base this decision on carbon dioxide output.
Whether it is "really" more eco-friendly or not would depend on whether you think that CO2 is going to destroy the environment. One question would be, how much carbon emissions were produced in the creation of the potassium hydroxide and its shipment? How much energy is required to heat up the "rather large" Resomator to 350ºF for 3 hours? This sounds just like the Toyota Prius all over again. While the Prius might use less fuel than a regular car; the manufacturing process is less environmentally friendly than that of a conventional car. This makes used cars more environmentally friendly than the Prius. The environmental impact of cremation, as a whole, would logically be less than resomation because the cremators are already manufactured and in place.
Here's a link to the company who pioneered this method of postmortem human disposal. The process is known as Resomation.
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4 comments
We are fortunate to be the first people with the know-how to minimize the public health risks and consumption of resources, at the time of our deaths. Cremating the dead dates back 20,000 years ago. Non-modern humans, with a brain volume placing it at the lower range of chimpanzees, decided to burn their dead.
It is time to evolve!
In a cremation, about 96% of a cremated body is discharged from a smokestack into our air. A human body is turned into pollution. On average, each person is reduced to hundreds of pounds of carbon dioxide, floating bits of body particles, toxins, water vapor, carcinogens, and other undesirable substances. Most troubling, each incinerated amalgam tooth filings (silver in color) contains .74 grams of mercury, an element second only to radioactive materials in terms of being hazardous to the living.
The cremationist, after exposing a body to temperatures in excess of 1,600 degrees Fahrenheit for a couple hours, collects what little is left of the charred body, which they refer to as ashes. It is legal for crematories to return commingled residue of bodies, as much as a cup in some states. The incineration process necessarily leaves residue of cremated bodies in the combustion chamber and along the smokestack. Cremating bodies fails to honor the world in which one lived. As the number of cremations climbs at an alarming rate, the deceased impose a heavy burden on the living. Cremation is not sustainable.
www.CycledLife.com for more on this better alternative.
Ed Gazvoda:It appears that you coppied this from the website "www.cycledlife.com".
OGRE, Some times it is good to read all the way to the end. Ed does give credit to the link you mentioned. I agree. It is tim to evolve. 1600 degrees does not equal 350 by a whole lot.
True there is no info about how much carbon emissions were produced in the creation of the potassium hydroxide and its shipment, non the less I believe only fools disregard an idea so easyly. Only by daring to view thing from a different angle new and better ideas are born.
In the other hand, I'm not too convincd that is better to stick to a certain way to do things just because it is already there. If cremation Chambers are there, and some co emisions must be produced in order to decrease such emission in the long run, then so be it. Your grandchildren will thank you. It is called an investment.
Lu:I think you missed the point. Ed didn't comment, he simply copied and pasted something from another site. That's a little different than quoting.
I don't look at causing environmental damage now (in a different way) a viable option to what exists now. Resomation is sold on the idea that it might help out in the long run.
This is an issue I have with most of the imposed "changes" for environmental reasons. They are usually not based on fact and have often been proven to have negative effects in the long run. When environmental impacts are the main selling point of an item; it's usually pointed out in advance to excuse the lack of effectiveness that particular item possesses.
Take the silly cork-screw light bulbs for example. Nobody takes into effect all of the mercury waste. Plus they still take too long to get to nominal brightness. Why not just skip the CFLs and wait on LEDs to come down in price? That's where the lighting industry is going anyway.
But even with LEDs there are unintended consequences. In the northern United States there are problems with the LED stop lights icing over, decreasing visibility. The answer; put a heater in the light assembly so ice doesn't form. The old light bulbs did this automatically and cost much less and are already in existence. The LED light with a heater installed uses almost the same amount of power as the original design using conventional light bulbs.
Now state governments have paid workers to drive large diesel burning bucket trucks to change thousands these lights when the old ones were already working. Then they had to go back (in the same large trucks) and put heaters in them.
I think too many people are ready to jump on the Eco-Friendly bus without thinking things though.
Sometimes it takes more than just good intentions.
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