Published August 19, 2010 12:00AM
An Australian company has developed a new, Earth-friendly way to dispose of human corpses, New Scientist reports.
Aquamation, a process where the body is placed in a steel container with potassium and water heated to about 200-degrees Fahrenheit, decomposes the body in four hours and uses 10 percent of the energy of cremation. As an added bonus, aquamation, unlike cremation, won't destroy artificial implants, making it possible to reuse them.
John Humphries, chief executive of Aquamation Industries in Gold Coast, Queensland, Australia told New Scientist that the watery remains make “a fantastic fertilizer.”
–Erin Beresini
Photo courtesy of Roberto Verzo on Flickr.