Concerned about the environmental impact of your burial or cremation? Well, don’t die. But if you must, consider a third option: have your corpse dissolved. In a procedure called alkaline hydrolysis, the deceased is put into a stainless-steel cylinder resembling a pressure cooker; application of lye, 300-degree heat, and 60 pounds of pressure per inch produces a brown, syrupy liquid that can be unceremoniously dumped down the drain. (It also leaves a dry residue that could be buried or displayed in an urn on the mantel, for those who wish.) The procedure has been used in the U.S. for over a decade to deal with animal carcasses, but hasn’t found popularity — or legality — in funeral homes. But thanks to its environmental advantages, it could yet take off. “It’s not often that a truly game-changing technology comes along in the funeral service,” the newsletter Funeral Service Insider exclaimed recently, but “we might have gotten a hold of one.”
