Healthy beverage initiatives: A case study of scenarios for optimizing their environmental benefits on a university campus

The association between consumption of sugar sweetened beverages (SSBs) and diseases including diabetes, liver disease and dental disease is well known, yet SSBs continue to be aggressively promoted, including on university campuses. Healthy beverage initiatives (HBIs) are focused on improving health by decreasing consumption of SSBs. Some HBIs also aim to improve environmental sustainability, e.g. by substituting tap water for SSBs, including the HBI on the 10 campuses of the University of California. However, there is no study of HBIs’ potential environmental benefits. To address this knowledge gap we carried out an environmental life cycle assessment of greenhouse gas emissions, blue water use, and plastic pollution for both liquid content and container for the 940,773 liters of beverages consumed in one calendar year at the University of California, Santa Barbara. We found that climate and water impacts per liter for liquid contents of 10 SSB beverage types and the non-SSB versions ...