The body of the tiny 78-yearold woman was brought to a hillside at Western Carolina University still clad in a blue hospital gown and chartreuse socks.
78歲老婦小小的遺體被帶到西卡羅來納大學的一個山坡上，身上仍然穿著醫院的藍色病人服和黃綠色的襪子。
She was laid on a bed of wood chips, and then more were heaped atop her. If all goes as hoped, the body will turn into compost.
她被放置在木屑床上，接著又在她身上堆了更多木屑。如果一切順利 ，屍體將變成堆肥。
It is a next step in the naturalburial movement. Even as more people opt for interment in simple shrouds or biodegradable caskets, urban cemeteries continue to fill up. For the environmentally conscious, cremation is a problem , as it releases greenhouse gases.
這是自然埋葬運動新的一步。儘管已有越來越多的人選擇以簡單屍布包裹或裝入可生物分解的棺材土葬，都市墓園仍是一位難求。而對高環保意識者來說，火化也是個問題，因為它會釋放溫室氣體。
Katrina Spade, a 37-year-old Seattle resident , has proposed an alternative: a facility for human composting. The woman laid to rest in wood chips is a first step in testing how it would work.
37歲的西雅圖市居民卡翠娜．史貝德提出了一個替代方案：一種製造人體堆肥的設施。把前述這位婦人埋葬在木屑中，是測試這套設施是否行得通的第一步。
"Composting makes people think of banana peels and coffee grounds," Ms. Spade said. But "our bodies have nutrients. What if we could grow new life after we've died?"
史貝德說：「堆肥讓人聯想到香蕉皮和咖啡渣。」她說，但是「我們的身體有養分。我們死後仍能讓新生命成長，難道不是件好事？」
Scientists agree human beings can be composted. Already countless farms across the country compost the bodies of dead livestock. Some transportation departments compost roadkill.
科學家同意人類可做成堆肥。全美各地已有無數農場以死亡牲畜做成堆肥。有些交通部門會把路上撞死輾死的動物做成堆肥。
"I'm absolutely sure that it can work," said Lynne Carpenter- Boggs, a soil scientist at Washington State University who serves on the advisory board of the Urban Death Project, a nonprofit that Ms. Spade founded.
史貝德所創立非營利組織「都市死亡計畫」顧問委員會的成員、華盛頓州立大學土壤科學家林恩．卡本特─博格斯說：「我打包票它一定行得通。」
The process is simple: Place nitrogen-rich material, like dead animals, inside a mound of carbon- rich material, like wood chips and sawdust, adding moisture or extra nitrogen . Microbial activity will start the pile cooking.
過程很簡單：將富含氮的物質如死亡動物，放置到富含碳的一堆物質中，如木屑和鋸屑，再添加水分或更多氮氣。微生物活動就會啟動這項堆肥發酵。
Bacteria release enzymes that break down tissue into component parts like amino acids, and eventually, the nitrogen-rich molecules bind with the carbon- rich ones, creating a soil-like substance. Temperatures reach around 60 degrees Celsius, often higher, and the heat kills common pathogens. There should be no smell. Bones also compost, but take longer than tissue.
細菌會釋放，將組織分解成氨基酸等成分，最後，富含氮的分子會和富含碳的分子結合，創造類似土壤的物質。當溫度達到約攝氏60度，經常更高時，熱度即會殺死常見的病原體。它應該無異味。骨頭也會變成堆肥，只是會比組織花更長的時間。
圖擷自Urban Death Project
Ms. Spade, who has a degree in architecture, has designed a building for human composting that marries the efficiency of this process with the ritual and symbolism that mourners crave. Each Urban Death facility would feature a three-story vault that she calls "the core." Loved ones would carry their deceased, wrapped in a shroud, up a circular ramp to the top. There mourners would place the body inside the core, which could hold perhaps 30 corpses at a time. Over several weeks, each body would move down the core until the first stage of composting was complete. In a second stage, material would be screened, along with any remaining bones, and the compost would be cured.
獲有建築學位的史貝德已設計好一個人體堆肥建築，將這項過程的效率與送葬者渴望的儀式和象徵意義相結合。每個「城市死亡」設施的特色是它有一個三層樓的拱形建築，她稱它為「核心」。親人扛著裹著屍布的遺體，步上一個環形坡道直到最上方。在那裡，送葬者將遺體送進核心，核心一次約可存放30具遺體。數星期後，每具遺體會被移到核心的下方，直到第一階段堆肥製作完成。第二階段是過濾材料與殘餘的骨骼，並將堆肥加工貯存。
Ms. Spade estimates that each body, combined with the necessary materials such as wood chips and sawdust, would yield enough compost to fill a one-meter cube.
史貝德估計，每具屍體連同木屑和鋸屑等必要的材料，足以產生可填滿一公尺長管子的堆肥。
Death rites can go from repugnant to normal in a surprisingly short time, said James Olson, a funeral director in Wisconsin and chairman of the green burial work group of the National Funeral Directors Association.
威斯康辛州殯儀師兼 「國家殯儀師協會」綠葬工作小組主席詹姆斯．歐森說，在令人意外的極短時間內， 葬禮儀式可從令人反感變成正常看待。
"If I had told you 50 years ago that we were going to burn your loved one," he said, " and pulverize their skeleton in a machine and give you back the crushed bone, you would have said, 'Eww.' "
他說：「若是50年前，我告訴你我們將燒掉你的親人，用機器將骨骸磨成粉，把碎骨還給你，你可能會說：『惡心』。」
He called Ms. Spade's concept "wonderful."
他認為史貝德的觀念「太棒了」。
But many others find the idea of composting human bodies repulsive . One critic on the Urban Death website commented: "This MUST be a joke. If not, there's only one word which could possibly describe your activities: SICK."
但很多人對人體堆肥的想法十分排斥。「都市死亡」網站上一名批評者說：「這肯定是個笑話。若不是，只有四個字可以形容你們的活動：令人作嘔。」
Questions also remain about how human compost should be used. Certain pathogens, like the prions related to mad cow disease, can survive composting, and livestock that have died from certain diseases are banned from composting. Some experts recommend that livestock compost not be spread on fields where fruits and vegetables are grown for human consumption.
人體堆肥該如何使用也仍是問題。某些病原體，例如與狂牛病相關的朊病毒，在堆肥中仍可能存活，死於特定疾病的牲畜也被禁止做成堆肥。一些專家建議牲畜堆肥不要撒在種植供人食用蔬果的田地裡。
And, as with cremation, heavy metal contamination could be a concern; dental fillings might have to be removed from bodies.
此外，和火化一樣，重金屬汙染也值得關注；補牙使用的填充物可能必須先從遺體除去。
Ms. Spade said survivors could collect some of the compost to use in their garden or to plant a tree. She foresees the rest going to nearby parks or conservation lands. Each human composting would cost about $2,500, a fraction of the price of conventional burial, she estimates.
史貝德說，死者親人可能想獲得些堆肥，用於自家花園或種樹。她預見剩餘的堆肥最後會進入附近的公園或保育土地。她估計，每個人體堆肥的製作費約2500美元，僅及傳統葬禮的一小部分。
She hopes to build the first facility in Seattle, then to develop a template other communities can use for locally designed facilities. "Like libraries," she said.
她希望在西雅圖建造第一個這種設施，然後發展出一個其他社區也可使用的模式，讓各個地方設計自己的設施。她說：「類似圖書館的作法。」
Beyond the environmental benefits to composting humans, she believes there is a spiritual one: connecting death to the cycle of nature will help people face their own mortality and bring comfort to the bereaved.
將人體變成堆肥不僅有環保好處，她相信還有精神層面意義，將死亡與自然循環相連接，有助人們面對自己的死亡，並帶給生者寬慰。
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