docs: update env variable guide (#1990)

* docs: update env variable guide

* docs: add note about access server-side variable access

1 files changed, 7 insertions, 5 deletions

diff --git a/docs/src/pages/guides/environment-variables.md b/docs/src/pages/guides/environment-variables.md
index 1f7f396ad..178cb276b 100644
--- a/docs/src/pages/guides/environment-variables.md
+++ b/docs/src/pages/guides/environment-variables.md
@@ -4,25 +4,27 @@ title: Using environment variables
 description: Learn how to use environment variables in an Astro project.
 ---
 
-Astro uses Vite for environment variables, and allows you to use any of its methods to get and set environment variables. Note that all environment variables must be prefixed with `VITE_` to be accessible by client side code.
+Astro uses Vite for environment variables, and allows you to use any of its methods to get and set environment variables. Note that all environment variables must be prefixed with `PUBLIC_` to be accessible by client side code. 
+
+The ability to access private variables on the server side is [still being discussed](https://github.com/snowpackjs/astro/issues/1765).
 
 ## Setting environment variables
 
-Vite includes `dotenv` by default, allowing you to easily set environment variables with no configuration in Astro projects. You can also attach a mode (either `production` or `development`) to the filename, like `.env.production` or `.env.development`, which makes the environment variables only take effect in that mode.
+Vite includes `dotenv` by default, allowing you to easily set environment variables without any extra configuration in Astro projects. You can also attach a mode (either `production` or `development`) to the filename, like `.env.production` or `.env.development`, which makes the environment variables only take effect in that mode.
 
 Just create a `.env` file in the project directory and add some variables to it.
 
 ```bash
 # .env
-VITE_POKEAPI="https://pokeapi.co/api/v2"
+PUBLIC_POKEAPI="https://pokeapi.co/api/v2"
 ```
 
 ## Getting environment variables
 
-Instead of using `process.env`, with Vite you use `import.meta.env`, which uses the `import.meta` feature added in ES2020 (don't worry about browser support though, Vite replaces all `import.meta.env` mentions with static values). For example, to get the `VITE_POKEAPI` environment variable, you could use `import.meta.env.VITE_POKEAPI`.
+Instead of using `process.env`, with Vite you use `import.meta.env`, which uses the `import.meta` feature added in ES2020 (don't worry about browser support though, Vite replaces all `import.meta.env` mentions with static values). For example, to get the `PUBLIC_POKEAPI` environment variable, you could use `import.meta.env.PUBLIC_POKEAPI`.
 
 ```js
-fetch(`${import.meta.env.VITE_POKEAPI}/pokemon/squirtle`
+fetch(`${import.meta.env.PUBLIC_POKEAPI}/pokemon/squirtle`)
 ```
 
 > ⚠️WARNING⚠️: