Atlanta 1/5/2011 3:25:50 AM
News / People

A UK crematorium may offer to freeze-dry and dissolve dead bodies.

Cambridge City Crematorium, located in the South of England, is considering giving people the option to have futuristic send offs for their loved ones - which are more environmentally friendly than present methods of burning corpses.

Bosses at the funeral home are seeking approval from their local council to let them use a process called ‘Promession’ or ‘Cyromation’, where a body is frozen to -196 Centigrade in liquid nitrogen. It is then so brittle it can be fragmented, freeze dried to remove moisture and the remains used as either environmentally friendly compost, or buried in a casket.

Another method the crematorium is looking at is putting bodies in silk bags and submerging them in a highly alkaline solution, which would dissolve them within three hours. This is called ‘Resomation’, and leaves a fine white powder of bone ash for the family.

Bereavement services manager Tracy Lawrence said: ''The plans propose improvements to the quality and value of services to customers and envisage a modern, forward-looking service delivering good value and offering improved returns to future investment.''