SAN ANTONIO – Sandi Joralemon recently lost her husband, and during the most difficult time for her and her family, she had little time to decide what steps to take next.
“The thought of a flame cremation upset me and brought me to tears knowing that my husband didn’t want to be buried. We didn’t want to make our children attached to a piece of property or land, and I knew he didn’t want to be embalmed,” Joralemon said.
Overwhelmed by grief, Joralemon was able to find a moment of clarity and peace by praying. She said that’s when she was able to research, which led her to a little-known method of cremation.
“I found water cremation, and I just immediately clicked on it and when I say clicked, I mean I went, ‘Oh, what’s this?’ Because my husband’s a nerd, and so I thought, ‘OK, let’s see what’s going on here.’ He’s going to want to know about this,” Joralemon said.
Alkaline hydrolysis, or aquamation, is a form of cremation that uses 95% water and 5% sodium hydroxide. It’s an alkaline solution that reduces the human body to bone fragments, which are then reduced to ashes.
It’s a process that Joralemon and her children felt was the best way to move forward.
“It’s a gentle acceleration of decomposition and I think that’s pretty cool. It’s a natural process using chemicals that we would normally use anyway. So, it wasn’t frightening, it wasn’t scary, and it brought peace and comfort,” Joralemon said.
Joralemon found her solution, but there was a problem. Water cremations are legal in 28 states, but not in Texas.
“I contacted the cremation company, and they called me back the next day because it was early in the morning and found out that I wasn’t able to do that in the state of Texas, that they would have to help me facilitate it through another state,” Joralemon said.
Currently Texas Senate Bill 105, authored by Sen. Nathan Johnson, aims to legalize the service and would add alkaline hydrolysis to the state’s definition of a cremation. The bill currently stands in committee.
Eric Neuhaus, founder and CEO of Cremation.Green, said this isn’t the first time a bill has been proposed in Texas.
“So, this is the fourth time that a bill like this has been proposed in the Texas Capitol. Every time, there are select religious groups that are in opposition to the bill, and so far, that’s been enough to disable it,” Neuhaus said.
The groups include the Texas Catholic Conference of Bishops, a federation of all Catholic dioceses and ordinates in Texas.
“The Texas Catholic Conferences of Bishops opposes the legalization of water cremation,” said TCCB executive director Jennifer Allmon. “We will continue to oppose these bills. Alkaline hydrolysis fails to treat the body with dignity and respect.”
Neuhaus said he wants Texans to have another option, which he said is more environmentally friendly and less expensive.
“We’re about 50% lower than an average cremation in the United States,” he said.
Neuhaus said water cremations don’t require extreme high heat, have zero emissions, and therefore doesn’t release any carbon into the atmosphere.
“So, the way I describe it is, it costs roughly $25 to $40 of natural gas or propane as the fuel needed for one cremation. That’s roughly the amount of natural gas one single family household uses an entire month,” Neuhaus said.
Joralemon said she traveled to Missouri where water cremations are legal. She said it would have been much easier if she would have been able to have her husband cremated by water in Texas.
Aquamation is legal in the following states:
- Alabama
- Arizona
- California
- Colorado
- Connecticut
- Florida
- Georgia
- Hawaii
- Idaho
- Illinois
- Kansas
- Maine
- Maryland
- Michigan
- Minnesota
- Missouri
- Nevada
- North Carolina
- North Dakota
- Oklahoma
- Oregon
- Tennessee
- Utah
- Vermont
- Virginia
- Washington
- West Virginia
- Wyoming