In Episode 154 of the Disruptors for Good podcast, we spoke with Matthew Kochmann, founder and CEO of Transcend, about the green burial movement and helping people and pets become trees when they die.
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What is a Green Burial?
Green burial, also known as natural burial or eco-friendly burial, is a type of burial that has a minimal impact on the environment. This usually involves using only natural materials to bury the body and avoiding the use of any toxic chemicals or processes.
There are many different reasons why a person may choose a green burial instead of a traditional burial. Some people believe that this type of burial is more respectful of the natural world and helps preserve the environment.
Others prefer a simple, natural process to more traditional burial practices.
What is Tree Burial?
Our bodies are filled with excess nutrients that are wasted when cremated or buried in a coffin. Finally, there is a better way to repurpose our bodies by returning them to the soil to feed and nourish forest ecosystems for decades.
Transcend’s Tree Burial™ process uses a unique fungi-enriched soil mixture that facilitates a direct connection between the nutrient-rich body and the root system of the tree planted above.
In this way, the body becomes biologically a tree, which creates and sustains the life of all that surrounds it.
How to Bury a Tree?
- The body is decorated with 100% organic biodegradable flax linen.
- It is then lowered into a bed of locally upcycled wood chips that help maintain optimal soil oxygen levels, creating the ideal environment for decomposition.
- Transcend’s unique blend of mycorrhizal-enriched fungi, soil, and wood chips is spread over the trunk to ensure that the tree gets essential nutrients like nitrogen and phosphorus directly from it.
- A young tree of your choice, hand-picked for longevity, beauty and location, is then planted on top of the body. The fungi create a direct network between the body and the roots of the tree so that the body’s nutrients can feed the tree and help it grow. In this way, your biology literally becomes a tree.
- A vast fungal network connects your tree to the entire forest. This means that if you are planted near your family, you will literally stay connected forever, supporting an entire ecosystem of life, together in a beautiful forest your people can visit for generations.
Tree Burial for Pets
More than 70% of pets are dumped at the vet’s office after being put down. Transcend’s Tree Burial Kit for Pets allows for a more purposeful and eco-friendly way to do right by your pet while bringing new life to their memory.
Transcend’s DIY Tree Burial Kit allows you to plant your pet as a beautiful tree near the house, so you can always keep them safe.
The Kit includes:
- Organic, biodegradable flax linen carrier used to transport and bury your pet (now available in Small (0-40 lbs) and Large (41-90 lbs) sizes).
- Transcend’s unique blend of soil enriched with fungi ensures a direct connection between the body and the tree.
- Step-by-step guide to Burying a Tree.
- 25 trees planted around the world in honor of your pet.
Transcend offers free shipping on all orders, and recommends purchasing a kit to have on hand as your pet ages. When the time comes, you can take the carrier with you to the vet for extra support. In the meantime, we will start planting trees for your pet today.
Traditional Burials vs Transcend Green Burials
- As a result of traditional burial, 20 million feet of wood, 4.3 million gallons of embalming fluid, 1.6 million tons of reinforced concrete, 17,000 tons of copper and bronze, and 64,500 tons of iron are placed in the ground each year. year (Green Burial Council).
- Cremation, once marketed as an eco-conscious alternative to traditional burials, releases approximately 600 million pounds of carbon dioxide each year.
- Tree Burial sequesters 5.8x more CO2 than a cremation emits.
- Theoretical design projects such as Capsula Mundi and Coeio’s Mushroom Suit went viral, drawing public attention to the Tree Burial concept, only to disappoint consumers that they were not viable solutions on the market.
- Some emerging green burial options – such as natural organic reduction and alkaline hydrolysis – are not carbon negative, and include steps (such as the use of a cremulator) that are relatively invasive to the body. They are also not legal in all fifty states.
- Transcend finally made the natural Tree Burial real and accessible.
About Matthew Kochmann
From a young age, Matthew Kochmann faced medical and mental health challenges that forced him to confront his own mortality, sparking a lifelong fascination with what how people relate to the mystery of death.
In an attempt to integrate a more acceptable approach, he turned to nature… Matthew found comfort and inspiration in the central tenets of the American Transcendentalism movement that Emerson developed with the ancient Vedic philosophies of India: that the all living things are involved, even after death.
While poetic, he was inspired to learn that this was also true scientifically in the natural world; when an organism is returned to the earth, it creates more life in everything around it.
With a Landscape Architecture degree from Cornell University, a track record of success as a serial entrepreneur, and experience as a land developer, it was only natural that Matthew brought Tree Burial into existence.
Creating values-aligned impact for the collective has always been his main aspiration. Above all, as employee #7 at Uber, he led the charge to change the old and offline taxi industry in NYC, to finally leave from a life-changing amount of equity in the practices. behavior.
Matthew’s unique blend of regulatory and real estate knowledge, infused with a spiritual passion for the environment makes him the ideal steward for the Future Tree movement.
About Transcend
Transcend is the first company dedicated to reforesting the world by replanting people (and pets) as trees when they die. Launching in October 2022, Transcend’s unique Tree Burial™ process is a climate change solution that reuses the most life-giving natural resource known to mankind: our bodies.
A bold, carbon-negative alternative to coffins and cremation, Tree Burial creates life from death by returning people to the earth naturally so their biology can literally live on as a tree.
Transcend is pioneering the Future Tree movement to help people develop a healthier relationship with their mortality and the planet. By using nature as a vehicle, Tree Burial reminds us that endings are always beginnings.
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