RE.GENERATION: Creating a New Public Grounds in Dead Zones by Nowak from usa

Death has fascinated us for centuries. From the mystery of dying in bed to great processions and ceremonies in cathedrals, "beautiful death" was a high point in our collective memory. Death was at the center of life, just as cemeteries were in the center of towns and villages. Today cemeteries are pushed outside our cities, and have turned the space they occupy into the function their hold within: a dead space. How do we bring life back to death? RE.GENERATION, therefore, proposes a technological as well as an ecological approach that redefines the practice of burial.

The process takes advantage of an innovative freezing method that accelerates the decomposition of the body, and at the same time uses the chemical process itself as a way to produce renewable energy. The electricity generated through this process is then used as a way of monitoring the decomposition process of the body as well as activating the space above. Because the body and the biodegradable coffin that holds it are fully decomposed within less than a year, the space can then be re-used by another body. Therefore, once a certain number of RE.GENERATION units are built, the cemetery would be in no need of expansion as the spaces would constantly be re-used.

Because of lack of space in cities, the system can be used as a series of green public spaces that bridge in between existing blocks. The vehicular streets can continue to run underneath while the space above is used to create a new public ground. But beyond the material, temporal, and spatial realities of death, this system redefines not only the practice burial, but also the sequence of grief, mourning, and commemoration through an advanced mechanism that draws the energy from the dead decomposing body, and brings a life to the space above.