It seems to me that a natural, dignified, and economic burial would consist of burying a body (possibly pasteurized by a high temperature soak but otherwise unprocessed) in protected forest areas, with a new tree planted over each gravesite. Longlived trees should be selected and each might be marked with a plaque with a suitable inscription honoring the person buried there. The plaque should be chosen to endure for 50 or 60 years, which would probably serve to identify the site for as long as anyone would desire to visit it.

The body would, obviously, provide nourishment for the tree so that each tree would represent the person in an emotionally beneficial manner while serving a useful purpose in carbon sequestration, air filtering, and terrain stabilization. A fee could be charged which would help fund an annuity sufficient to maintain the forest.

I see no reason to think that a tree would be a less fitting and satisfying memorial for a person than the currently fashionable block of stone. It would symbolize a form of continuing life while the stone is some poor inert monument already millions of years old.

I was with you up to the pasteurized body. The high-temperature soak might...ummm...well...make the body look rather unappealing for a viewing. And if you aren't having a viewing, why not just place the body in the box and off to the forest?

My personal opinion is that viewings are a bizarre custom and I give them short shrift. I don't see where having a quietly decomposing, and often damaged body on view contributes positively to any sort of ceremony. I suppose that it would be possible to have a viewing without embalming if the body were kept at a low temperature in a sealed glass-topped coffin. I would assume that the coffin and supporting systems would be reused indefinitely.

My reason for pasteurization (and I don't think the temperature needed would be highly destructive to the body, although irradiation might be an alternative) would be to calm any fears of spreading disease by handling unembalmed bodies. I would assume that the body would be contained in a rapidly biodegradeable material. I would suggest perhaps the pressed peat moss used in planting, which go into the ground still containing the young plant and break up under the influence of the roots, watering, and microorganisms. I think that an unembalmed body would provide a better source of nutrients for the trees - I have to expand on this by saying that, after the person dies, I consider the tree to be a more important object than the body.

Something along the lines of this:

Green Funerals

USA TODAY

Thank you for hitting the mother lode.