Bio-Cremation Coming to the Twin Cities

In a basement room at the University of Minnesota College of Veterinary Medicine sits a giant squat machine. It is what scientists there call a "tissue digester." To the general public, it is a device for bio-cremation, an alternative to disposing of remains by the standard burning cremation.

Bio-cremation has become a headline in some areas of the United States because it is slowly becoming available for human cremations. One funeral home in Stillwater has been issued a permit for the process by the Metropolitan Council. The State Department of Health's Mortuary Science section must issue a license once a bio-chemical machine is installed.

The process involves a fluid mixture of water and an alkaline chemical. It is heated to about 300 degrees for a number of hours until the soft tissue is dissolved.

"The liquid effluent goes to the sanitary sewer. What is left after that part of the process is the mineral portion of the bone," explained Ron Joki, U of M Senior Scientist and Necropsy Lab Manager. "You can imagine skeletal remains, what look like intact bones, but really, they've lost all their strength. You could take that bone and basically crush it or break it with your hands."

In human bio-cremation, the process involves one body at a time. In the U of M's much larger animal machine, up to 7,000 pounds of remains can be processed at once.

The pulverized bone is the ash from either type of cremation that is returned to the deceased family. In the case of the U of M Tissue Digester, the ash is used for fertilizer and landfill, since it is then considered bone meal, according to Joki.

In a bio-cremation, the effluent is cooled and the Ph level is controlled before it can release into the sanitary sewer. The process is considered far less expensive and environmentally polluting than the burning type of cremation. However, hosting municipalities, like the Metropolitan Council, must certify with a permit, that the sewer system can handle the effluent.

State Health Department officials believe that a bio-chemical device is en route to the funeral home in Stillwater and could be offering the service to the Twin Cities early in 2012.

The process has been legal in Minnesota since 2003. The U of M's animal facility was installed in 2005, as was a human bio-cremation machine at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester. The Mayo device has been used to dispose of 750 remains of individuals who had donated their bodies for scientific research, according to Clinic officials.

Cremation has become increasing popular in the new Millenium in Minnesota. In 2010, for the first time, cremations exceeded the number of burials. There were 18,905 burials and 19,331 cremations in the state, according to the State Department of Health.

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