WALNUT CREEK, Calif. – A Swedish biologist has developed a new rite of final passage that offers families an environmentally safe burial alternative – the freeze-dried funeral.

Called Promession, the process was invented and patented in Sweden by Susanne Wiigh-Masak in 1999.

Essentially, the corpse is submerged in nitrogen, which renders it extremely brittle. With gentle shaking or vibrating, the body crumbles.

The remains are then dried, reducing them to about 30 percent of the body’s weight. A magnet passed over the odorless and hygienic remains removes harmful metals.

What’s left is placed in a biodegradable casket and given shallow burial in the mulch-forming layer, where it finds its way back into the biocirculation within six to 12 months.

Promession costs about the same as cremation and has the advantage of not contaminating the environment with mercury emissions from amalgam dental fillings.

“Promession is a way of taking care of human remains with highest dignity in order to make mulching possible,” says the Promession Foundation’s Web site.

The first Promession funeral home will be in Jonkoping, Sweden, and is expected to open some time this year.

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For more information:

The Promession Foundation:

www.promessafoundation.org

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(c) 2006, Contra Costa Times (Walnut Creek, Calif.).

Visit the Contra Costa Times on the Web at http://www.contracostatimes.com.

Distributed by McClatchy-Tribune Information Services.

AP-NY-08-06-06 0601EDT