The funeral industry is working to expand choices beyond burial and cremation. One of these methods of disposition has made it to the chambers of state capitols.
By Adina Solomon, Contributor
ATLANTA—UNTIL RECENTLY, people in the U.S. had two main choices for disposition of a body after death: burial or cremation.
New Jersey Enacts Aid-In-Dying LawAs the green burial movement has questioned the energy and resources required of these methods, another option has emerged: dissolving a body in water, or alkaline hydrolysis.
A body is submerged in a solution of heated water and lye. After a matter of hours, everything but the bones dissolve into a liquid made up of water, salt and other components safe enough to go down the drain. The remaining bone fragments can be crushed into ash for scattering, burial or memorialization. Body donation programs such as the Mayo Clinic have long used the process, sometimes known as water cremation.
If it isn't available already, alkaline hydrolysis could arrive in a funeral home near you. Twenty states – including Florida, Utah and Illinois – have legalized the process, especially over the past 10 years. California legalized it in 2017, with the law taking effect on July 1. A Georgia bill legalizing alkaline hydrolysis for all funeral homes, not just ones that have a crematory, passed the Senate in February, on its way to the House. A Texas bill has waited to move forward for the past three years.
But casket companies and the Catholic church have endeavored to halt the legalization of alkaline hydrolysis.
"A lot of funeral and cemetery law honestly is a gray area," says Tanya Marsh, a law professor specializing in funeral law at Wake Forest University.
States, not the federal government, typically decide these laws. So proponents of alkaline hydrolysis, mainly people in the funeral industry, must go to every state legislature for legalization. Western, Great Plains and Southern states have been more amiable toward alkaline hydrolysis than ones in the Midwest and Northeast, Marsh says.
One opponent is the casket industry; alkaline hydrolysis doesn't use a casket. The Midwest has a lot of these companies, Marsh says.
One of the most well-known legal skirmishes took place in Indiana. In 2015, a bill to legalize alkaline hydrolysis stood for a vote. A state representative, who owns two casket manufacturing businesses, spoke against it, the only legislator to do so.
The bill lost. Alkaline hydrolysis remains illegal in Indiana.
The Catholic church has also opposed legalization. While Marsh has not seen an official Catholic position on alkaline hydrolysis, individual dioceses and priests have come out against it. Catholic clergy from Missouri to Washington to Texas have expressed public opposition with varying success.
Alkaline hydrolysis was once legal in New Hampshire, but a bill to re-legalize it failed in 2009. The Catholic church in New Hampshire came out against the bill, also testifying against later legislative efforts in 2013 and 2014.
In some states in the Midwest and Northeast, which has an above-average representation of Catholics, Marsh has seen Catholic legislators seek advice on alkaline hydrolysis from their priests, who express doubts.
"Local priests and maybe dioceses have taken a position against it or at least said, 'We need more time to figure this out,'" she says. "Legislators have taken their cues from that less-organized position."
These States Have Aid-in-Dying LawsFor example, after speaking with the Archdiocese of Cincinnati, a Catholic state representative in 2012 removed language from an Ohio bill that would have legalized alkaline hydrolysis.
Right now, eight of the 20 states where it's legal have practitioners of alkaline hydrolysis, says Barbara Kemmis, executive director of the trade association Cremation Association of North America. CANA provides education on alkaline hydrolysis.
"The industry is kind of following behind as far as the business aspect of it goes," she says. "But the elected officials and regulators and media recognize a curiosity about this new form of disposition and an interest on behalf of consumers."
The death care industry is competitive, and funeral homes want to offer more choices to people, Marsh says. Plus, alkaline hydrolysis has a lower price tag than cremation.
"People are increasingly turning away from burial and they want to find other options. And there's a lot of folks who are particularly bothered by the high energy consumption of cremation by fire, and so alkaline hydrolysis is a much better option," she says. "If there are only a couple of funeral homes in a market that offer that, that's a distinguishing factor and so that might attract more business to your funeral home."
Cremation is more popular than ever, accounting for a majority of dispositions in the U.S., according to CANA. But crematories are less popular. No one wants to live next to one, so obtaining approval to build a new crematory is difficult, Kemmis says. Some funeral homes and cemeteries have pursued alkaline hydrolysis as another option.
Though alkaline hydrolysis now makes up a small percentage of dispositions, Kemmis says it will only grow.
"It is a viable option in many areas, and it's an interesting option to consumers," she says. "It's captured the imagination of consumers who are like, 'Wow, water – that's gentler. That's interesting. That's different.'"
Adina Solomon is a freelance journalist based in Atlanta
