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Green Funerals

 

ENVIRONMENTALLY FRIENDLY BURIAL & CREMATION. 
  

 

Heritage Funeral and Cremation is dedicated to providing sustainable and environmentally friendly choices to Inland Northwest families. 

 

We believe in providing families with choices that protect and preserves the earth in the future while providing dignity and honor to your family today.  

 

 

We are proud to be the first funeral home and cremation provider in the Inland Northwest to provide three sustainable options for burial or cremation.   Green Burial allows for cemetery interment without harmful products or processes; Aquamation provides a signficantly reduced carbon footprint compared to traditinal cremation, and Terramation allows families to experience a new life through the reduction of remains in soil.   Learn more about these options below, or by contacting Heritage Funeral & Cremation.

 

Green Burial

Green Burial at Forest Grove at Riverside Memorial Park provides sustainable interment in a natural environment.

Discover more below.
Green Cremation

An alternative to traditional heat-based cremation, aquamation provides an alternative without the consequences.

Click to Read More.
Terramation or Human Composting

Terramation (otherwise known as human composting) gently transforms human remains into nutrient-rich soil that can be used to promote new life

Learn More About Terramation.

GREEN BURIAL

Forest Grove at Riverside Memorial Park allows families the ability to provide a final resting place for their loved ones in a sustainable and earth friendly manner.



All the products used at Forest Grove are 100% natural and/or 100% biodegradable, allowing the grove to maintain in its natural state.



Our team utilizes earth friendly sustainable methods for each burial and cremation placement to minimize disturbances to the natural ecosystem.



Heritage Funeral and Cremation offers two packages for those who want both a sustainable and affordable final resting place:

DIRECT GREEN BURIAL

Our Direct Burial offering for Green Burial provides the key essentials needed for a dignifiied and earth-friendly burial.



Our Direct Burial service includes the following:

  • Basic Service of Heritage Funeral Home Staff
  • Refrigeration
  • Transfer from Place of Death to Funeral Home
  • Transportation to Cemetery

CELEBRATION OF LIFE GREEN BURIAL

The Celebration of Life Green Burial Package provides our most popular funeral services which can save money while also saving the environment.


This package includes the following services:

  • Basic Service of Heritage Funeral Home Staff
  • Refrigeration
  • Bathing, Dressing and Casketing
  • Use of Facility and Staff for Celebration of Life event
  • Transfer from Place of Death to Funeral Home
  • Use of Funeral Coach
*Package prices do not include caskets, containers, markers/monuments or internment. See additional information below. Your final cost will be determined on any additional services or products you and your family may also desire. Please contact us at Heritage Funeral and Cremation to explore your options and their costs.

 

If you decide to select a green burial or cremation, you will be able to choose options that are friendly to the earth and use materials that are produced in a sustainable manner.


Whether you desire cremation or body burial, green burial provides caskets, carriers and urns that are designed to decompose in time. This is the opposite of conventional burial, which uses concrete vaults and caskets (or urns) that are designed to protect the body or ashes.


Green burial uses caskets (or carriers) and shrouds (used to wrap the body) which are designed to facilitate and encourage the decomposition process (and decompose themselves). The purpose is to enable the natural, organic decomposition of the body over time.


Below are examples of a few of these types of carriers. Contact us at Heritage Funeral and Cremation for more options and information on these products.




sustainable caskets
Biodegradable Urns

 

AQUAMATION / GREEN CREMATION

An alternative to heat-based cremation.

While cremation is considered more environmentally friendly than burial, the requirement of heat for traditional cremation has drawbacks: It both releases harmful toxins into the environment and uses a lot of energy to complete.


Green cremation, using a process called alkaline hydrolysis (also referred to as aquamation), uses water and potassium hydroxide to reduce the body to ash without requiring the consumption of energy to product flames at the required temperature. This process uses less energy and avoids releasing any of those harmful toxins.


Heritage Funeral and Cremation is the first cremation provider in the Inland Northwest to offer alkaline hydrolysis. For more information, please contact us at Heritage Funeral and Cremations and we would be happy to answer your questions.


What are the benefits of aquamation / alkaline hydrolysis?


NO BURNING OF FOSSIL FUELS
NO DIRECT EMISSIONS OF HARMFUL GREENHOUSE GASES OR MERCURY
1/7 OF THE ENERGY REQUIRED

 

TERRAMATION

Terramation (otherwise known as human composting) gently transforms human remains into nutrient-rich soil that can be used to promote new life.


Heritage Funeral & Cremation is an exclusive partner of Return Home™, the leader in developing a unique and sustainable alternative.


Return Home™ has a unique human composting process that will then allow the soil to be returned home to the family. Every person is created uniquely as therefore the human composting process can have varinging timelines based on the makeup of the individual. Return Home’s™ human composting process takes roughly 60 days to complete and creates between one and one-and-one-half cubic yards of soil that can be used for returning to gardens, landscapes, or other scattering grounds as the family desires. This also allows for many family and friends to receive terramated remains to create a memorial that is fit for the memories they have.


THE PHASES OF HUMAN COMPOSTING:


Human composting is a two stage process, and takes approximately 60 days to complete. These are the phases the person goes through during the human composting process.


LAYING IN: Our laying in service allows families to bid their loved ones farewell in person or virtually while also adorning them with items that show love and celebrate their memory.


TERRAMATION™: Oxygen flows through the vessel which stimulates microbes in the body. These microbes rapidly transform the body into soil in just 30 days.


RESTING: The soil is screened for inorganics and placed into a cube to rest and cool for the next 30 days.


LIFE GROWS ON: Beautiful life giving soil is ready to Return Home or to be scattered at The Woodland.



Terramation Process

 

Learn More 

GREEN FUNERALS, GREEN BURIAL, AND GREEN CREMATION: 

A GUIDE TO SUSTAINABLE MEMORIALIZATION

 

If you are looking for additional resources and information about the sustainable options listed above, or want to know more about which methods are the most enviornmentally-friendly, we are pleased to offer a 14 page guide to sustainable memorialization with our Green Burial and Cremation eBook.

 

We ask that you simply complete some basic information below and you will be redirected to a page where you can download your free guide to Green Burial and Cremation.

 

Green Burial & Cremation Guide Download Form

 
 
 
 
 
 

 

 

 

 

WE ARE HERE FOR YOU

 

Heritage Funeral & Cremation is dedicated to supporting you and your family during the difficult time of losing a loved one.  It is our goal to do everything we can to ensure that your cremation and funeral arrangements are precisely what you and your family desire and always done in a professional and dignified manner during your time of need.   

 

We would be honored to help you make arrangements for immediate cremation , traditional funeral services, or to consult with you on making your own memorialization plans at any time. 

 

CALL US:

 We are here to answer any questions or concerns you may have and be with you during this difficult time. 

(509) 838-8900  


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