The first Australian burial using a mushroom-grown coffin has taken place in New South Wales, offering a new eco-friendly alternative to traditional funerals.
Carolyn, whose surname was withheld for privacy, was buried by her family and friends at Springwood Cemetery in the Blue Mountains on Friday. She was in her 70s.
Her coffin was made by Dutch company Loop Biotech using mycelium — the root-like network of fungi — combined with hemp fibres. The coffin is grown in a mould inside a climate-controlled room and takes about a week to fully form.
Once buried, the coffin can become part of the soil in around 45 days. The process works similarly to composting, allowing both the coffin and body to biodegrade and return nutrients to the earth.
By comparison, a traditional wooden coffin can take up to 50 years to break down. The mushroom coffins weigh about 30kg each.
Carolyn’s husband, Donald, said the choice reflected his wife’s values and her desire to give back even after death.
“She was always there to help others. It feels very true to who she was that even after her death, she can still do something for others while giving something back to nature,” he said.
Carolyn is the first person in Australia to be buried in the mushroom coffin, although Loop Biotech founder Bob Hendrikx said thousands of people in Europe and the United States had already used the coffins.
Hendrikx said there had been strong interest from Australia when he launched the company five years ago, but shipping the coffins overseas had been more difficult at the time.
He hopes the coffins will help make Australia’s funeral industry more sustainable by speeding up the decomposition process and enriching the soil.
“It’s about giving back to nature: we have the mushroom, which is grown and dissolves into nature, but the actual benefit is that … it’s enriching the soil,” he said.
“The body needs to just return to nature and let nature do what it’s done best forever.”
Cultural anthropologist Dr Hannah Gould from the University of Melbourne said interest in environmentally friendly funeral options was growing as people explored alternatives to traditional approaches to death and burial.
She said the idea of returning to the earth rather than moving on to an afterlife had become increasingly popular, particularly as people became less religious and placed greater emphasis on environmental values.
About 70 per cent of Australians choose cremation, but a typical cremation is estimated to produce emissions equivalent to 125kg of carbon dioxide.
Other alternatives, including alkaline hydrolysis, natural burials without embalming and shallow burials, have also emerged. A natural burial using a cardboard coffin and rope handles is estimated to produce less than 10kg of carbon dioxide equivalent.
Gould said longer life expectancies and prolonged illnesses had also led more Australians to think carefully about how they wanted to be remembered and how their funerals should be conducted.
She said many people who had experienced difficult funerals for their parents were now choosing to plan their own farewells differently.
