Green Options » Coke

Can Diet Coke Kill You? Part 2

Zachary Shahan — Sun, 15 Nov 2009 11:10:11 +0000

Due to the great popularity of “Can Diet Coke Kill You?” combined with a lot of controversy over it, I have decided to write this follow-up post.

Most of the controversy over the last article was around the fact that the documentary I referenced cited data from the National Cancer Institute (NCI) but that organization itself claims there is no proven link between aspartame and cancer.

What was presented previously was a short explanation of why aspartame is expected to cause cancer and other health problems and a summary of some information presented in Sweet Misery, including findings from analyzing NCI and other data. This article, however, cites other scientific findings and discusses the economic-political history of this topic a little bit as well.

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Did Diet Coke Cause My Cancer?

Rhonda Winter — Sat, 31 Oct 2009 23:27:12 +0000

Recently I have been reading very disturbing research about how Diet Coke can possibly cause cancer and kill you. The artificial sweetener that is used in most diet beverages, aspartame, once ingested, becomes a lethal poison called methyl alcohol. Small quantities of this noxious substance can lead to blindness and death; even the most miniscule amounts of this aspartame toxin are strongly linked to cancer.

This is an image of the cancerous tumor that was recently removed from my body.

Brands and Culture, Symbiotic?

Ryan Jones — Thu, 01 Oct 2009 02:19:31 +0000

When you need to urgently need to blow your nose in Germany and don’t have a tissue on hand, you might ask a friend “Hast du ein Tempo?” (Do you have a Tempo?)

Tempo, it turns out, is a brand of tissue, not the German word for tissue.

Substituting a brand name for a general product description is relatively common across a number of languages. How many times have you heard someone say “Just Google that” or “Can I have a COKE please”? Over the years, powerful brands have impacted our culture and slipped into our language. For a brand, this is the ultimate compliment and a big awareness driver. In fact, Coke and Google (the 2 examples above) are now the #1 and #2 brands respectively on Interbrands latest list of powerful brands. Tempo continues to be a very powerful brand in Germany.

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Can Diet Coke Kill You?

Zachary Shahan — Mon, 28 Sep 2009 08:45:10 +0000

According to a UK documentary, “Sweet Misery,” the National Cancer Institute identified a significant and impressive increase in brain cancer starting in about 1984. Why did brain cancer shoot up? It looks like it is because of articial sweeteners such as those found in diet drinks and food!

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Coke Extends Commitment to Reduce Carbon Footprint

Ruedigar Matthes — Mon, 27 Jul 2009 22:30:58 +0000

In 2002 the Coca-Cola Company used 3.12 liters of water to produce every liter of poduct. The company, which has captured the taste buds of drinkers worldwide used .57 megajoules of energy and averaged 12.54 grams of waste per liter of product. It’s no wonder that the Coke Kingdom has been less than popular among environmental groups.

With concern for the environment rising among pop culture, however, Coke’s pop has begun to lose its fizz with more than just special interest groups.

Since 2002 the Coke Kingdom has made some changes in order to become more sustainable. In India, the company has worked to offset their water usage by establishing local rainwater harvesting facilities. Over the last two years, Coke has installed 320 rainwater harvesting structures across 17 states in India.

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Coca-Cola Launches Eco-Friendly Packaging

Lisa Wojnovich — Sun, 31 May 2009 23:43:12 +0000

In their ongoing efforts to achieve a more environmentally friendly image, the Coca-Cola Co. announced earlier this month that they will be launching new biobased plastic bottles for their Dasani water line later this year and vitaminwater next year. They’re calling their new packaging the “PlantBottle^TM.”

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The New Pepsi Challenge: Greening the Soft Drink Industry

Lisa Wojnovich — Tue, 31 Mar 2009 15:50:24 +0000

If you live in Washington, D.C., keep your eyes open this April. PepsiCo, the makers of Pepsi, Mountain Dew, and Aquafina, have begun field-testing 30 green vending machines. The machines feature a redesigned Pepsi logo and are prominently marked as green technology.

Apparently, the cola wars spilled over into the green tech sector a few years ago. Coca Cola has placed vending machines that use hydrofluorocarbon (HFC) alternatives at the Olympic Games since 2004 as well as at several other international events. Not to be outdone, along with the machines Pepsi is testing in the nation’s capital, they are testing a few thousand other machines around the world that use other green refrigerant alternatives to HFCs. Moreover, the older models these green machines are set to replace are themselves improvements over models from 2003. Both companies have also joined with Greenpeace and several other corporations to form the Refrigerants, Naturally! coalition, a group determined to reduce the environmental impact of HFC refrigerants.

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Core Industries on the death of PR stunts and the “Age of Consequence”

Olga Orda — Tue, 10 Mar 2009 17:32:36 +0000

Talking with Corey Szopinski, Principal and Founder of Core Industries.

Your firm has worked on some pretty cool projects like Live Earth and Pepsi, 1% for the Planet and the Volkswagen Carbon Neutral Project. Tell us what your clients come to your company for and what makes Core Industries different from other interactive strategy, design and development firms.

We’re the next evolution of a boutique interactive marketing firm. We are one of the few very high end development shops that has a clear mission of focusing on the triple bottom line: people, planet and profit. Clients come to us because they know that we get invested in their projects, their company, and their people, because we care about what we’re doing… we not out to make a quick buck. In fact, our overall mission is to help foster the emerging green economy. Our way of doing that is by using graphic design, computer science and marketing strategy to help our clients be more “sustainable”. And for us sustainability has a dual meaning: it means being responsible for our environment, but it also means making sure the business is sustainable. In other words, we help our clients thrive, not just survive.

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Coca-Cola to Receive Top Sustainable Development Award from World Environment Center

Pamela McLeod — Tue, 27 Jan 2009 22:12:09 +0000

Next time you pop open a coke or drink a VitaminWater, sip on this. The 2009 World Environment Center’s (WEC) Gold Medal for International Corporate Achievement in Sustainable Development will be awarded to the Coca-Cola Company. The award recognizes the beverage giant for achievements in water stewardship, packaging, climate change, and energy management.

Watching out for Water

Coca-Cola’s Signature Contribution is in the area of water stewardship. The company’s goal is to restore to the environment all water that is used to produce of its products. It aims to achieve this through reducing the amount of water in the manufacturing process, recycling water back into natural systems, and locally relevant conservation projects. With a new report predicting global water shortages by 2020, increased attention to water and natural systems seems increasingly imperative. (Hopefully Coca-Cola includes the water needed to grow and process the sugar in its calculations - approximately 200 L of water per can in Europe.)

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Distributor Sued for Selling Illegal Cane Sugar Sweetened Mexican Pepsi

Jennifer Lance — Tue, 06 Jan 2009 04:01:46 +0000

I don’t drink sodas primarily because they contain high fructose corn syrup (HFCS). Apparently, I am not alone in my concern over HFCS, as cane sugar sweetened Pepsi and Coke from Mexico are desirable in the United States. I’m not sure I would risk Montezuma’s revenge from Mexican water to drink a sugar cane sweetened soda from south of the border; however, the long term negative effects of HFCS may be far worse. Unfortunately for natural soda lovers, Mexican Pepsi and Coke are illegal in the US.

PepsiCo has filed a lawsuit in federal court against Clayton Distributing Company in Georgia for violating trademark laws, committing fraud and engaging in deceptive, unfair trade practices by selling sugar cane sweetened, Mexican Pepsi in the United States.

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The Coke/Pepsi Challenge: Which Soda Works Best as a Pesticide?

Jennifer Lance — Sat, 20 Dec 2008 19:41:11 +0000

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Odd-ball, Weird or Funny, but Spermicide Coke Wins Alternative Nobel Prize

Sam Aola Ooko — Mon, 06 Oct 2008 10:57:51 +0000

Odd-ball green news it may be but Coke has been discovered to be an effective spermicide, which may be good for the environment; and for that very elaborate effort of discovery, a woman’s sexuality expert has just been awarded an alternative Nobel Prize for Chemistry.

Weird or wacky, you might say, but rumor actually has it that Snopes.com might soon bring down this link that debunked the long suspected (was it an urban legend until the Ig Nobel Prize?) but now confirmed sperm killing effects of the famous Coca Cola soft drink.

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Shades of Green: Polar Bears and Global Warming

Jeff McIntire-Strasburg — Mon, 12 May 2008 15:41:28 +0000

Or, more evidence for the skeptics. Thanks, as always, to Brad and Peter. Check out more of their work at The Green House.

Searching for Peace, Love and Santa Claus

Gavin Hudson — Mon, 24 Dec 2007 14:27:03 +0000

The German intellectual, Georg Lichtenberg, once said that “to do just the opposite is also a form of imitation,” but reversing Saint Nicholas’ image is certainly not the most sincere way to flatter it.

What’s the truth about Santa Claus? Who is this large, jovial fellow with flying reindeer and hordes of merry elves? If the truth about Saint Nicholas can lay the commercial icon to rest, maybe it can also restore the true meaning of Christmas as a time of peace on Earth, love and goodwill toward all.

Santa as a commercial icon undercuts the ideology of benevolence and humble giving. See this video on the chain of consumption for an idea of who gets left out when Santa goes corporate. A truer idea of the real Saint Nicholas and his current image around the world might reconnect us with the greater feelings of compassion and caring that should symbolize this (and every) season.

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