What Is a Green Burial? Natural Burial, Tree Pods, and Eco-Friendly Options

A green burial is the burial of an unembalmed body in a fully biodegradable container, directly in the earth, with no concrete vault. That is the whole definition. Everything else labeled green is either a variation on it or a different disposition method entirely.

Green burial typically costs $1,500 to $5,000, compared with $12,000 to $15,000 for a conventional burial with cemetery costs. The Green Burial Council counted roughly 470 green burial cemeteries across the United States and Canada as of late 2024, though many cemeteries that do not require vaults have never reported or sought certification.

This guide covers what a green burial actually involves, what a green funeral looks like, what tree pod burial does and does not offer today, and how the newer alternatives compare.

What is a natural burial, exactly?

Natural burial and green burial mean the same thing. The practice has three requirements:

1. No embalming, or embalming with a non-toxic, formaldehyde-free fluid. Refrigeration or dry ice preserves the body until burial instead. Embalming is not required by law in any state for a burial without an extended public viewing.
2. A biodegradable container. A shroud, an unfinished pine or poplar box, a woven wicker, willow, seagrass, or bamboo casket, or pressed cardboard. No metal fittings, no varnish, no plastic gaskets.
3. No burial vault or grave liner. The body returns to soil directly. Graves are often dug shallower than the conventional six feet, closer to three and a half to four feet, where soil is biologically active and decomposition proceeds fastest.

Markers, where allowed, are flat native fieldstone, an engraved wooden plaque, a GPS coordinate, or a planted native tree or shrub. Green burial grounds usually look like a meadow or woodland rather than a mown lawn with rows of granite.

The three levels of green cemetery

The Green Burial Council certifies burial grounds in three tiers, and the differences matter when you are evaluating a place:

• Hybrid burial ground. A conventional cemetery with a green section. Vaults are not required in that section. The rest of the cemetery operates normally.
• Natural burial ground. The entire cemetery prohibits vaults, conventional embalming, and non-biodegradable containers. Landscape management is minimal.
• Conservation burial ground. A natural burial ground legally tied to a conservation easement held by a separate land trust. Burial fees fund permanent land protection and habitat restoration. These are the strictest and the rarest.

Certification is voluntary, not mandatory. Plenty of cemeteries follow the standards without paying for certification, so call and ask directly rather than ruling out an uncertified location.

What is a green funeral?

A green funeral is the ceremony and preparation surrounding a green burial. In practice it usually means:

• Home or family-led care of the body where state law permits, including washing and dressing by the family
• Refrigeration rather than chemical preservation
• Local, in-season flowers or none at all
• A shorter transport distance, since the burial ground is chosen near where the family lives
• Family participation in the burial itself, including lowering the shroud or casket by hand and filling the grave with shovels

Many families find the physical participation to be the most meaningful part, and it is the part most conventional funerals removed.

What does conventional burial put into the ground?

Advocates cite these figures often. They are estimates compiled from industry and casket-association data by the Green Burial Council and Funeral Consumers Alliance chapters, and they cover annual U.S. totals:

• Roughly 1.6 million tons of reinforced concrete in burial vaults
• Roughly 20 to 30 million board feet of hardwood in caskets
• Roughly 64,500 tons of steel, plus copper and bronze
• Roughly 800,000 gallons of embalming fluid, containing formaldehyde, which the National Cancer Institute has studied for occupational cancer risk among embalmers

U.S. cemeteries also occupy an estimated 2 million acres of land, held in a single use permanently.

Treat these as directional. They are widely republished, and the original methodology is decades old in places. The direction is not in dispute even where a specific tonnage is.

What does a green burial cost?

Most families pay $1,500 to $5,000 for a green burial. The savings come from what is absent: no embalming, no vault, no metal casket, and usually no granite monument.

Three charges catch families off guard: grave preparation billed separately from the plot, refrigeration billed separately from the basic services fee, and the funeral home's non-declinable basic services fee, which still applies at an NFDA median of roughly $2,459 if you engage a funeral home at all. Our green burial cost guide goes deeper, and the burial plot cost guide covers regional variation.

Veterans should note that VA burial allowances apply to green burial the same as any other, at up to $1,002 for a non-service-connected death for deaths on or after October 1, 2025.

What is a funeral shroud?

A funeral shroud is a length of natural fabric, typically cotton, linen, hemp, wool, or silk, that wraps the body for burial in place of a casket. Shrouds are the oldest burial practice still in continuous use and are standard in Jewish and Islamic tradition.

Most modern burial shrouds sold in the United States include a reinforced board or a lowering harness with handles, because a shrouded body has to be carried and lowered by hand. Some green cemeteries require a rigid board beneath the shroud for that reason; others do not. Ask before you buy.

Shrouds are the least expensive biodegradable option and the fastest to break down. Families sometimes sew their own, or wrap a person in a quilt or blanket that mattered to them, which is permitted at many natural burial grounds.

What is a tree pod burial?

A tree pod burial places remains in an egg-shaped biodegradable pod with a tree planted above it, so the tree grows from the burial site. This is the option with the largest gap between what people picture and what is actually available.

Here is the honest state of it:

Cremation-based tree pods are widely available in the United States. These are biodegradable urns designed to hold cremated remains along with soil and a sapling. They typically cost $135 to $450 for the pod itself, plus a sapling, plus the land. A whole arrangement including cremation commonly runs around $2,500. Our guide to biodegradable urns covers the category.

Whole-body tree pods are still a concept. The Italian design studio Capsula Mundi generated enormous media coverage for a full-body pod, and that image is what most people mean by tree pod burial. It has not been brought to market. There is no release date. What Capsula Mundi actually sells today is the smaller cremation urn version.

If you want a body to nourish a tree, the available route is a conservation or natural burial ground that permits a planted tree over the grave, not a pod. Several do. That is a real, legal, currently available option and it accomplishes the same thing.

State rules differ on where any of this can happen. Home burial on private land is legal in most states with permits and setback requirements, and a handful of states require a licensed funeral director to be involved.

Is cremation environmentally friendly?

Cremation avoids permanent land use, concrete, and embalming chemicals, but it burns fossil fuel to hold a chamber near 1,800 degrees Fahrenheit for two to three hours.

Estimates commonly cited by the Green Burial Council put a single cremation at roughly 139 to 250 pounds of carbon dioxide, and note mercury emissions from dental amalgam, measured at 14 to 16 percent of total mercury emissions in Minnesota and United Kingdom studies respectively.

Set against a conventional burial's concrete vault, metal casket, embalming fluid, and permanent land commitment, cremation is generally the lower-impact of the two. Set against a natural burial, it is not. The Green Burial Council estimates that a vault burial emits roughly 250 pounds of carbon across a fifty-year plot life cycle, while green burial sequesters roughly 25 pounds.

Crematories can reduce impact through modern filtration, mercury abatement, and electric or high-efficiency retorts. Our green cremation guide covers what to ask a provider.

Aquamation vs. cremation: what is the difference?

Aquamation, also called alkaline hydrolysis or water cremation, dissolves soft tissue in a heated, pressurized solution of water and alkali over roughly four to six hours, leaving bone fragments that are processed and returned to the family exactly as flame cremation does.

The family experience is nearly identical. You receive remains in a container, and every option available after flame cremation is available after aquamation.

Two practical caveats. Legal does not mean available. Many of the 26 states that have authorized alkaline hydrolysis have few or no operating providers. And the category remains tiny: CANA's 2025 statistics preview estimates newer disposition forms, including alkaline hydrolysis and natural organic reduction, at about 0.1 percent of U.S. dispositions nationally and about 0.3 percent in states where they are practiced.

Our water cremation guide covers the process in detail.

What about human composting?

Natural organic reduction, commonly called human composting, places a body in a vessel with wood chips, alfalfa, and straw, where microbial activity converts it to roughly a cubic yard of soil over 30 to 60 days.

As of mid-2026, 14 states have legalized it: Washington, Oregon, Colorado, Vermont, California, New York, Nevada, Arizona, Maryland, Delaware, Minnesota, Maine, Georgia, and New Jersey. Bills have passed, stalled, or been vetoed in others, and Rhode Island's legislature advanced a bill in 2026.

Families receive a portion of the soil and may direct the remainder to conservation land. It is worth knowing that the Catholic Church does not accept human composting, though it permits flame cremation under specific conditions. If faith is a factor, ask your clergy member before you plan around it.

How to verify a provider is actually green

"Green" is not a regulated term in American funeral service. Ask these questions and listen to how specific the answers are:

• Is a vault or grave liner required in the section where I would be buried? A yes means it is not a green burial, whatever the brochure says.
• Do you accept a shroud, or do you require a rigid container?
• What is your embalming policy, and will you refrigerate instead?
• Are you certified by the Green Burial Council, and at which level? If not certified, which of their standards do you follow?
• Is the land protected by a conservation easement, and who holds it? This is what separates a conservation burial ground from a marketing claim.
• What can I plant, and what happens to the grave site in fifty years?

Our guides to eco-friendly memorial options and biodegradable memorial options cover the product side.

If you choose cremation or aquamation, there is a second decision

Green burial ends with a decision made. There is a grave, a tree, a piece of protected land, and the question of where a person rests is settled.

Cremation and aquamation both end with remains handed back, and a question left open. In our national study of 1,000 U.S. adults who had received a loved one's cremated remains, 76 percent had not carried out a final plan. Among those still undecided, 74 percent named an emotional reason rather than any information gap. Roughly 65 percent said they would explore a new way to honor their loved one if it felt right to them.

Families take many paths from there: scattering in a meaningful place, burial in a natural burial ground, a biodegradable urn with a tree, dividing remains among relatives, or keeping them at home. Our guide to what to do with cremated remains walks through the range.

Solidification is one more option on that list. Parting Stone offers solidified remains, a patented process Parting Stone pioneered that gently transforms virtually all of a person's cremated remains into 40 to 80 or more smooth stones a family can hold, place, carry, share among relatives, or scatter. It works with flame cremation and with water cremation remains alike. More than 14,000 families have chosen it.

It is not greener than a natural burial and it is not offered as a substitute for one. It exists for families who want a form they can hold. If that is a question you are carrying, read more about solidified remains whenever you feel ready.

Frequently asked questions

What is a green burial?

A green burial is the burial of an unembalmed body in a fully biodegradable container such as a shroud or untreated wood casket, placed directly in the earth without a concrete vault or grave liner. Markers are natural, and burial grounds are managed as meadow or woodland rather than mown lawn.

How much does a green burial cost?

Most families pay $1,500 to $5,000. A cotton or linen shroud costs $100 to $300, an unfinished pine box $400 to $700, and a woven casket $700 to $1,500. Plots run $500 to $1,500 in rural areas and $1,000 to $4,000 in urban or conservation burial grounds, with grave opening adding $500 to $2,000.

Is a tree pod burial available in the United States?

Cremation-based tree pods, which hold cremated remains with a sapling, are widely available and cost $135 to $450 for the pod. Whole-body tree pods, including the widely publicized Capsula Mundi design, have not been brought to market and have no release date. A natural burial ground that permits a planted tree over the grave achieves the same result today.

Is cremation environmentally friendly?

Cremation avoids permanent land use, concrete vaults, and embalming chemicals, but consumes fossil fuel and produces an estimated 139 to 250 pounds of carbon dioxide per cremation plus mercury from dental amalgam. It is generally lower impact than conventional burial with a vault and higher impact than natural burial.

What is the difference between aquamation and cremation?

Aquamation, also called alkaline hydrolysis or water cremation, uses heated water, alkali, and pressure over four to six hours instead of flame. Both return processed bone fragments to the family, with aquamation typically yielding 20 to 30 percent greater volume. Aquamation is legal in 26 states; flame cremation is legal in all 50.

Do you need to be embalmed for a green burial?

No. Green burial requires that the body not be embalmed with conventional formaldehyde-based fluid. Refrigeration or dry ice preserves the body until burial. No state requires embalming for a burial without an extended public viewing.

Where is human composting legal?

Natural organic reduction is legal in 14 states as of mid-2026: Washington, Oregon, Colorado, Vermont, California, New York, Nevada, Arizona, Maryland, Delaware, Minnesota, Maine, Georgia, and New Jersey.

Can you be buried in just a shroud?

Yes, at most green and natural burial grounds. Some require a rigid board beneath the shroud so the body can be carried and lowered by hand. Conventional cemeteries usually do not permit shroud burial. Confirm the policy with the specific cemetery before purchasing.