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  • Image Artistic rendering of Prairie Oaks Memorial Forest
Prairie Oaks

The Prairie Oaks Memorial Forest project (Prairie Oaks) will convert a modern cemetery located in Inver Grove Heights (Dakota County, Minnesota) into a green cemetery. The three acre cemetery has fifteen modern graves and is platted for a total of 3,200 graves. Our vision for Prairie Oaks is to convert this modern cemetery into a nature preserve cemetery by reducing the intensive burial density of 3,200 polluting graves to 1,600 green graves. We’ll restore native grasses and plant evergreens, oaks and other deciduous trees. And we’ll actively involve the community through programs for education, science and the arts. In a short time this formerly modern cemetery will transition from its manicured lawn appearance to a natural landscape with all green burials except the initial fifteen (that’s less than 1% of total burials). Adjacent expansion lands of oak savannahs and prairie will be purchased and restored to accommodate additional green burials.

Protecting the Environment - Conservation in Action

The modern funeral and burial industry pollutes the environment every year by burying millions of tons of concrete and metal caskets, thousands of gallons of toxic formaldehyde and millions of board feet of rainforest hardwoods. Modern cemeteries spend millions on maintenance every year. This requires the use of machines that emit carbon monoxide and greenhouse gases in order to keep a manicured appearance.

The initial three-acre Prairie Oaks environmental project will mitigate environmental pollution by preventing 3,000 gallons of toxic embalming fluid, 292.5 tons of steel for caskets, 6,084 tons of concrete for vaults and 168,750 board ft. of preserved hardwoods for caskets from being deposited into its three acres. Moreover, by converting this cemetery from modern to green, we prevent countless tons of fertilizers and pesticides from being deposited into the soil.

In addition, Prairie Oaks conserves water resources. Ron Smith, a horticulturist at North Dakota State University, estimates that under the worst conditions a cemetery of three acres would need to be watered for twenty minutes, three times a week, using fixed sprinklers, in order to keep the grass green. This will require 27,152 gallons of water per acre to deliver 1 inch of water on to the cemetery. So 27,152 gallons multiplied by 3 acres is 81,456 gallons of water that would be applied to the cemetery every week. If you water for 26 weeks and multiply that times 81,456 gallons, you would prevent 2,117, 856 gallons of water from being used on the cemetery to keep it green.

Green cemeteries avoid these practices all together and instead provide a natural environment where wildflowers and wildlife flourish. Modern burial works hard to keep the natural elements away from the body. Green burial invites Mother Nature to take the body as quickly as possible and thereby create new life. Prairie Oaks will be an ecosystem that invites and supports wildlife, flora and fauna that allow you to truly bloom where you are planted!