Last Swill and Testament

Umbra on diet soda 13

Dear Umbra,

My name's Jon and I'm a diet pop addict. My diet right now is 70-80 percent local, organic, or both, but I just can't help myself when it comes to getting my fix. I drink several 20-ouncers a day of diet and just can't seem to stop. Is my habit hurting the earth? Common sense says that water from my stainless steel canteen is a whole lot better than chemicals from a plastic bottle, but my addict brain is grasping at straws, hoping that diet pop is one of those rare exceptions.

Jon B.
Lakewood, Ohio

Dearest Jon,

As you no doubt know, your question is funny, and the answer is: Of course your processed beverage and its container have an environmental impact. Plus, it's gotta be horrible for you. The ingredients were made in a lab, and I'm not sure the new fortified Coke or Pepsi diet sodas (Niacin! B vitamins! Chromium!) will close the nutrient gap. Several countries and at least one American state have tried to ban aspartame, that pop-ular artificial sweetener. Health isn't my bailiwick, though. I get to ignore your teeth, intestines, and major organs and focus on the planet.

Aspartame the beast.

 

 

 

Is your habit hurting the earth? Sure -- the manufacturing process for the chemicals (synthetics and "natural flavors," anyone?) all have emissions impacts. But more on the carbon footprint of soda ingredients in a moment -- first we must speak of Coke and water. I use Coca-Cola as a whipping boy (er, representative example) because there is ample documentation about how the soda giant operates.

Water is the primary ingredient in all Coke products, and a major component of pop-making in general. Each liter of a Coke product requires approximately 2.5 liters of H20 -- and that's just at the bottling plant. In 2006, for example, Coca-Cola apparently sucked up about 80 billion gallons of water for use in its drinks, for growing the ingredients, and for general manufacturing uses. The mildest thing we can say about your addiction in this context is that it wastes water. A harsher comment might be: You are actively complicit in global corporate water hogging, stealing a scarce resource from impoverished communities.

We can also get a little extrapolative climate change information on your addiction from our new toy, the Carnegie Mellon Green Design Institute's Economic Input-Output Life Cycle Assessment model. Remember, EIO-LCA is an online tool that calculates the overall environmental impact of producing certain dollar amounts of various products. In this case, we click on the "food, beverage, and tobacco" industry, then choose "soft drink and ice manufacturing," which, the model reveals, involves power generation, grain farming, wet corn milling, trucking, aluminum production, paper mills, oil and gas extraction, and more. Forgive my ignorance -- do you spend somewhere in the dollar-and-change range on those 20-ounce plastic bottles? If so, and if "several" per day means three, you're drinking more than $1,000 retail per year, which must be at least $500 worth of wholesale soda per year. For each $500 of economic activity in wholesale soft drink and ice manufacturing, 0.439 metric tons of CO2 equivalent are released. Given those very approximate numbers, and leaving lots of wiggle room to account for variations in soda brands, your fizz fixes emit maybe half a ton of CO2 equivalent a year. To what is this comparable? Flying round trip from Cleveland to New York City.

As to the packaging, I sweetly refer you to the many discussions in this space about the importance of reusable vessels over disposable (search Grist for "plastic bottle" and prepare to be rewarded). Yes, your stainless steel canteen, used many times, is better than a single-use plastic bottle. And it's certainly better than virgin aluminum -- gadzooks. In sum, as we already knew, your diet soda habit is not remotely compatible with the rest of your organic, local food lifestyle. You alone can decide if the impact of the addiction is acceptable to you and by extension to your fellow earthlings. Water also has a large advantage over diet drinks: It is good for you. In fact, you can't live without it.

Drippily,
Umbra

 

Yours is to wonder why, hers is to answer (or try). Send your green-living questions to Umbra.

Umbra Fisk is Grist Research Associate II, Hardcover and Periodicals Unit, floors 2B-4B.

Related Stories

Advertisement
Advertisement

  1. zegg Posted 1:45 am
    11 Aug 2008

    try making your soda at homeI've found a more environment-friendly way of having fizzy drinks - worried about my husband's expensive fizzy water habit, I bought a home carbonator - you fill a (reusable PET) bottle with tap water, screw it into the table-top machine and a few presses of the button later, have fizzy water. The CO2 canister is sent back to be refilled when it's emptied (which will only be about 1X a year for us). The company also sells sachets of flavorings, which you mix into the carbonated water to get the soda of your choice. It's already saved me a ton of money, not to mention kept a lot of plastic bottles out of the recycling bin. And hopefully reduced my carbon footprint too.

    Permalink

  2. texasjenny Posted 2:13 am
    11 Aug 2008

    Fountain drinks/refillsI would think fountain drinks would have a smaller impact. As in the above suggestion, the water is carbonated on site (reducing tranport needs), and there is much less packaging (canisters of carbonation and of soda syrup).

    Certain convenience stores offer the ability to refill, so you can reuse a container of your own. Another option is limiting yourself to restaurants that use reusable glasses.

    Permalink

  3. achoirguy Posted 2:15 am
    11 Aug 2008

    Thanks UmbraThanks for answering my question!!! Ironically, I finally took the plunge and gave up drinking anything but water 6 days ago. I can't tell you how bad my head HURT the first three days. I'm starting to feel human again and am loving the fact that I don't have to empty my recycling every three days.

    Jon

    PS- I'm embarrased to admit that by "several" pops a day I meant five or more. Holy cow!

    Permalink

  4. jbackler Posted 4:15 am
    11 Aug 2008

    What about club soda?Are the impacts similar for club soda in aluminum cans? I switched from imported fizzy water (mainly from Italy) to club soda. I believe in terms of carbon footprint that this must be an improvement as the club soda is produced in Canada using our own water supplies and I believe the Ontario recycled aluminum industry is alive and well. Not crossing the ocean has got to be an improvement.
    But... is the production of club soda as water-intensive as the representative example Umbra uses for soda?
    What other negative environmental impacts might my club soda drinking entail?

    Permalink

  5. sherrieh's avatar

    sherrieh Posted 5:24 am
    11 Aug 2008

    Here's another vote for home carbonationyou can find seltzer bottles/soda siphons for under 40$, and the chargers run ~50¢.

    Permalink

  6. soul Posted 9:18 am
    11 Aug 2008

    On "miles" and "footprints"Similar to the logic behind much conversation about â€oemiles” and â€oefootprints” hereâ€TMs another way of viewing the consumption of diet sodas.  According to Ernest Schusky, an anthropologist and author of Culture and Agriculture: An Ecological Introduction to Traditional and Modern Farming Systems, it takes "approximately 2,200 calories of energy to produce a single can of diet soda.”      
    - cited in â€oeMeeting the Agricultural Challenges of the 21st Century With a Little Help From Liberty Hyde Bailey” by Fred Kirschenmann, Distinguished Fellow, Leopold Center for Sustainable Agriculture at Iowa State University.

    Permalink

  7. soul Posted 1:21 pm
    11 Aug 2008

    RE: Correction Comment: On Miles and Footprints...I apologize, this is a correction to a comment I posted earlier On Miles and Footprints.  Besides the formatting issues, I left out the kicker - and am rightfully ashamed!    
    While I'm at it, here's a more fitting title -thanks!
    On Carbon Footprints and Energy Consumption...
    Similar to the logic behind much conversation about "miles" or "footprints" here's an interesting fact I recently learned in regards to diet drinks.  
    According to Ernest Schusky, an anthropologist and author of "Culture and Agriculture: An Ecological Introduction to Traditional and Modern Farming Systems, it takes "approximately 2,200 calories of energy to produce a 12-ounce can of diet soda" consisting of just 'one' calorie.*  
    22,000 calories in to get 1 calorie out - our bodies only require 2,500 per day on average to function properly (there's a twisted irony in that too).  
    I can't help but think about what the amount of calories I use per day means in sustainable terms.  
    *cited in "Meeting the Agricultural Challenges of the 21st Century With a Little Help From Liberty Hyde Bailey" by Fred Kirschenmann, Distinguished Fellow, Leopold Center for Sustainable Agriculture at Iowa State University, 2007.

    Permalink

  8. anlu37 Posted 1:56 am
    12 Aug 2008

    What about your body?While I'm sure there is a huge negative impact on the enviornment, I'd have to say that there is an even bigger impact on your body. I LOVE diet coke, but as soon as I cut back significantly and started using detox foot pads from http://www.purifyyourbody.com I felt so much better. I never realized how awful I really felt until I got all of those toxins out of my body!

    Permalink

  9. cavecanem Posted 5:03 am
    12 Aug 2008

    Detox Foot Pads...are a sham.
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Detox_foot_pad

    Permalink

  10. KT82 Posted 12:58 am
    13 Aug 2008

    Don't forget the CO2 IN the sodaI know that at least some of the CO2 in the soda is sourced from ammonia production facilities (where CO2 is a byproduct).  This means that the CO2 is a made from natural gas (and I feel certain that the majority of the CO2 is produced from natural gas or petroleum). This means that drinking soda and burping out that CO2 is not a whole lot different than combusting the petroleum product.

    Permalink

  11. scibug Posted 2:11 am
    14 Aug 2008

    thirst quenchingBut (wo)man does not live by water alone... so although it's not carbonated, I have to put in a plug for my favorite soft drink - iced tea.  Ok, I know tea has to be imported, but a little goes a long way.  I bought a 12 cup coffee carafe, and fill it with boiling tap water and a few tea bags.  After steeping, stir in a spoonful of organic sugar and pop it in the fridge.  It's there cold and thirst-quenching when I get home from work, it's cheap, and tea is even touted to have antioxidant benefits. You can even compost the used bags!

    Permalink

  12. saramor Posted 2:47 am
    22 Aug 2008

    Eiolca.netI was so excited to see the Q&A about the life cycle assessment of sodas. I had no idea the Carnegie Design Team's interactive tool existed online. So with my tail wagging, I visited their site and...well...I'm confused. How do the "total econ $" translate into Co2 outputs? The tutorial or help site didn't help me any. Is there someone who can explain this me?
    Thnx!

    Permalink

  13. saramor Posted 3:09 am
    22 Aug 2008

    Life Cycle AssessmentI'm excited to have found out about the Life Cycle Assessment tool from the folks over at Carnegie. But I'm confused as to how the economic dollars translate into CO2 emissions. Thanks in advance to anyone who can clear this up for me..

    Permalink

Add a Comment

You are not logged in. Thus, you cannot post a comment. If you have an account, log in. If you don't have an account, well, by all means go make one! Meet you back here in five.

Hello, Visitor!    Why not register?

Viewed
More
Commented
More
Advertisement