Overview

• The Landtag approved the reform with votes from the governing SPD–Greens–FDP coalition and the AfD, while the CDU and Free Voters opposed it after a heated debate.
• New options include home retention of urns, river burials on the Rhine, Mosel, Saar and Lahn, nonreligious shroud burials, and synthetic diamonds from ashes, with scattering on private property allowed if owners consent.
• Safeguards require the deceased to have had their last main residence in Rhineland-Palatinate and to have set out their wishes in writing; only licensed undertakers may dispense ash portions, leftover ashes must be interred in a cemetery, and urns may not be buried on private land.
• The government targets an October start but must still issue implementing rules for river sections, a gap that funeral directors say leaves practical questions unanswered.
• Church leaders warn of a privatization of mourning and lost public remembrance, municipal associations foresee funding shortfalls for cemeteries, and the law also codifies rights for ‘Sternenkinder’ and mandates autopsies in unclear deaths of children up to six.