Question:
Someone told me that if you drink a lot of no-cal drinks, it is an easy way to assist in losing weight.

It goes like this:

Since you are drinking for example Diet-Coke, which has no calories, the act of digesting the beverage burns calories. The more you drink, the more calories are burnt. In addition, the effort of walking to the bathroom also take up calories.

She postulated that just by doing this, you can lose about 10 lbs. a year.

Does this make sense or is it hogwash?

Answer: by definition a calorie (lower case) in the energy it takes to heat 1 mililiter of water 1 degree Celcius, but what you read on nutrition labels are actually kilocalories - the amount of energy it takes to heat a liter of water 1 degree Celcius. Calories burnt in this way is relatively insignificant.

Look at it a different way, though. If you drink 4 cans of soda, each with 150 calories, every day, and you switch to diet soda, or even better yet- water, you eliminate 600 cals/day from your diet. this can add up to a pound of fat a week. I don't think it is accurate to say you will lose a pound/week as it is to say that is a pound you WON'T GAIN.

I DID see an article someone posted last week linking drinking a lot of water to preventing the formation of fat. Although I realize it is very important to drink a lot of fluid, I'm a bit skeptical about it actually preventing fat formation.