All the buzz

Energy drinks give young drinkers new source of caffeine and sugar.

Suck down an energy drink and you'll sizzle with new-found energy, ace your next exam and flap through the sky on taurine, ginkgo and guarana-powered wings. At least that's what the makers of energy drinks want us to think. But are those fizzy caffeine- and vitamin-stoked beverages any different from a cup of coffee or can of soda? And could they be harming people who guzzle too many?

Scan the refrigerated section of the corner store. It's overflowing with energy drinks with names such as Inked, Red Bull, Go Fast and Vamp. More than 500 of the slickly packaged drinks were introduced in the U.S. in 2007, and they're discussed in blogs, reviewed on Web sites and promoted at sporting events. Buy one and you're buying into a whole hip, young culture.

Credit Austria-based Red Bull for starting the trend in 1987 when it unveiled a carbonated, citrus-flavored drink it claimed could improve performance and concentration. Red Bull sold

about 2.5 billion cans worldwide last year.

Sales of energy drinks in the U.S. hit about $5 billion in 2007, up from $3.5 billion in 2006. Most brands target male teens and people in their 20s, but the market is broadening, according to John Sicher, editor and publisher of Beverage Digest. Consumers are drinking them to study harder, stay up later and party longer than the rest of us.

It's a culture that Seth Juarez, a 26-year-old employee of the Jewelry Channel in Austin, knows well. He launches his workday with a cup of coffee, then gulps a low-calorie energy drink. He repeats the process as the day wears on.

"Mostly, I drink them for energy," Juarez says. "To be honest, I'm not too keen on the taste. It might be psychological, but (when I drink one) I don't feel tired. That's the key — if I'm dragging, I drink a Red Bull."

He also mixes Red Bull with vodka or Jägermeister when he goes out. "When you drink alcohol, you can get tired, so it's a way to go out all night ... You don't get that down, 'Oh man, I've had too much to drink' feeling."

Today there's an energy drink for almost every personality. Energy drinks are eating into the soft drink market. Top sellers include Monster, produced by Hansen Natural Corp.; Rockstar, distributed by Coca-Cola; AMP, from Pepsi; and Full Throttle, produced by Coca-Cola. Hundreds of others, including Syzmo, developed in Austin, have jumped into the market.

"Americans have a growing interest in functional beverages that do more than just refresh and taste good," says the beverage industry's Sicher. "Energy drinks fulfill that goal perfectly. A consumer drinks one and feels a boost of energy almost instantly."

Most are packaged in 8- or 12-ounce cans that are taller and thinner than the typical soda can. They come in regular and sugar-free versions, liquid, powder or tablet form, and even 2-ounce noncarbonated "shots."

Most people say they drink energy drinks for the kick. These aren't sports drinks like Gatorade, uncarbonated blends of water, sodium and sugars designed to rehydrate sweaty athletes. They're amped up with caffeine — sometimes two or three times the amount in a cup of coffee — and loaded with herbs and vitamins.

"They're for people who don't like coffee but still want an energy boost when they're hitting that 3 p.m. lull," says Jim Karwowski of Power Brands, which owns the Energy Drink Reviews Web site at bandddesigns.com. The site has reviewed about 350 drinks and gets about 5,000 hits a day from readers who gush about their favorites or bad-mouth ones they don't like. "Younger kids see (drinking energy drinks) as something their parents might disapprove of."

That much ballyhooed boost comes from two things: caffeine and calories.

An 8.3-ounce can of Red Bull contains 76 milligrams of caffeine — about twice as much as a 12-ounce can of Coke and about the same as an 8-ounce cup of coffee. Under Food and Drug Administration rules, a single serving of a food or drink can contain no more than 65 milligrams of caffeine. But energy drinks aren't regulated by the FDA, so they can — and do — contain more, up to 300 milligrams of caffeine per container. It's sometimes hard to tell how much caffeine an energy drink contains because it can come from several sources. Guarana, for example, a dietary supplement derived from the seed of a South American shrub, contains caffeine but is usually listed separately on ingredient panels.

Some drinks also contain a slew of ingredients most of us can't pronounce — such as taurine (an organic acid) and ginkgo biloba (derived from the leaves of a Chinese tree) — that manufacturers say help sharpen our mental focus. But research is slim on those effects. Most of those ingredients, says Alexa Sparkman, a registered dietician in Austin, are superfluous — our bodies just don't need them. We're better off getting nutrients from foods in which they occur naturally.

That energy boost you think you're getting? Maybe it's all in your head. "You may feel more energetic, but many times it's more of an emotional or psychological or placebo effect," Sparkman says. Caffeine, a stimulant that affects the central nervous system, can make you jittery, and that can be interpreted as an energy boost. "But there's nothing in here that would truly give you energy that you're not getting from a well-balanced diet."

Most energy drinks contain as much high fructose corn syrup or sugar as regular soda, although low-calorie and low-carbohydrate versions do exist. Monster contains about 14 teaspoons of sugar and 200 calories in one 16-ounce can.

"A calorie is a calorie is a calorie," Sparkman says. "If you're drinking these things, you're still adding calories to your diet."

Besides the added calories, the drinks sometimes contain a surprising amount of sodium — 200 mg or more per serving. At $1.50 to $4 each, they're expensive, too. For some folks, the added vitamins in energy drinks serve as a rationale for a bad habit, Sparkman says.

All that excess has inspired a Web site, energyfiend.com, where visitors can check sugar and caffeine content of their favorite drinks. They even can plug in their weight, choose a drink and calculate (in good fun, of course) how many they would have to drink to kill themselves.

But there could be some real cause for concern amid the hype. What are all those energy-boosting ingredients doing to our bodies? A Wayne State University study showed that energy drinks increased blood pressure and heart rate levels in healthy adults who drank two cans a day — bad news for people with high blood pressure or heart diseases. In Chicago, a poison control center handled 265 cases of caffeine abuse involving energy drinks and pills such as NoDoz over a three-year period. The users' average age was under 21.

"The appeal is that it's not your grandmother's cola, its an anti-brand, it's new and young," says Dr. Mary Claire O'Brien, associate professor of emergency medicine and public health sciences at Wake Forest University. "Mawmaw drinks coffee, but Joe College and Young Executive drink energy drinks."

O'Brien led a study on another worrisome energy drink trend — mixing them with alcohol, a popular practice at area bars. Mixing Red Bull and vodka, known regionally by names including Raging Bull, Heart Attack and Lawnchair, has been popular for a decade. Now some energy drinks are even pre-mixed with alcohol and sold next to nonalcoholic cans in places that can sell alcoholic beverages. That can create confusion, especially among parents and police.

O'Brien did her study after treating a student admitted to the hospital nearly comatose after drinking energy drinks and alcohol all night. She found that students who drank alcohol mixed with energy drinks were twice as likely to be hurt or injured, require medical attention or ride with an intoxicated driver compared with students who drank alcohol without energy drinks. Students in her study had decreased motor coordination, visual reaction and judgment whether they were drinking plain alcohol or alcohol mixed with energy drinks. But those who chose to mix the two didn't feel as drunk and were more likely to continue drinking.

"That you're able to drink more alcohol is the thing that's risky," O'Brien says. "I definitely think a statement is in order that alcohol and energy drinks shouldn't be mixed. And I absolutely think you shouldn't be able to put an ingredient into an alcohol beverage that is known to decrease subjective intoxication."

Bottom line? Consumed in moderation, most energy drinks are not any worse — or any better — than drinking a can of soda. For those who like the way they taste, it's OK to drink them in moderation. But beware the empty calories and hidden caffeine punch. And remember, there are less expensive ways to get the nutrients your body needs.

"Whatever happened to water?" Sparkman says.