Under pressure from investors the Southern Company has agreed to share environmental impact information about water use at power plants. Requests for environmental impact data are up 50-percent this year.

Southern Company is opening will compile and release the data because investors asked the Securities and Exchange Commission for information on plants nationwide.

Dan Bakal is with Ceres, a network of large investors focused on climate change. He says shareholders want to know how companies plan to deal with environmental issues.

“How they’re managing their coal fleet and the environmental impacts of them, or the water risk and water scarcity issues that their plants face, things like that.”

Investors also want to know how the company is reducing coal ash risk at its plants. In Georgia Southern Company has 38 plants.

Tags: Southern Company, Security and Exchange Commission, CERES, Dan Bakal, investors and environment