‘Human composting’ laws pass parliament in Australian first

So-called “human composting” will become legal in NSW under Australian-first laws, with several MPs revealing they want their own bodies turned into soil after they die.

A private member’s bill by independent Sydney MP Alex Greenwich passed parliament’s upper house on Wednesday, clearing the way for human body composting to begin in specially designed facilities from 2028.

The process will be legally known as terramation after the Minns government insisted on a more palatable description than “natural organic reduction”.

A relatively new addition to an industry dominated by cremations and burials, terramation is only legal in one part of Germany and 14 US states. The Herald revealed earlier this year that Greenwich planned to expand its use to NSW.

Techniques vary depending on the provider but the process generally involves a body being placed in a “vessel” packed with organic plant material such as lucerne, hay and sawdust. The temperature inside the vessel is raised for several days as the body and plant materials break down.

After at least one month, most of the body has been consumed and only bones and medical implants remain. The bones are removed and ground down in a cremulator before being returned to the mix. After several more weeks of “resting”, the compost is packaged into bags or containers and given to families to scatter around trees, or to donate to parks and landcare projects.

During a debate in parliament on Wednesday, Labor MP Cameron Murphy, Greens MP Amanda Cohn and Libertarian MP John Ruddick said they would want to be composted after death.

“We are conscious this won’t be something that everybody will be happy about, but on balance we can see that this is a matter of personal choice,” said Nationals MP Sarah Mitchell.

Liberal MP Susan Carter did not oppose the laws but sounded a note of caution on how soil would be used post-terramation.

“Life is a continuum and the respect we show for the human body is inextricably linked to the respect we show for the living,” she said. “Our bodies are valuable not because they contain nutrients … they are valuable because they are more than the sum of these nutrients.

“Our lips are not valuable because they can fertilise the Christmas salad. They are valuable because of the words they have formed, the ideas they have expressed, the love that they have shown, and the way in which all of that is remembered.”

Greenwich’s bill stipulates that a person can’t be composted against their wishes.

The NSW cremation rate has recently surged to 70 per cent in Sydney and 75 per cent in regional NSW amid land shortages and surging burial costs. Human composting is priced somewhere between cremation and burial.

NSW authorities will spend the next two years finessing various regulations before composting begins.

“Terramation has undergone extensive scientific testing to ensure it is safe for people and the environment, and I am thankful to my colleagues for their unanimous support for this historic reform,” Greenwich said.

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