"Lawyers for Harvard University will appear in court on Friday to fight off attempts to force the world’s richest university to dump coal, oil and gas companies from its $36bn (£23bn) endowment."

"A federal judge in New Orleans has rejected BP's effort to cap its fines from the 2010 Gulf of Mexico oil spill at $9.57 billion, nearly one-third lower than the penalty federal prosecutors are seeking. The court has not yet ruled how much the British oil giant will pay for the disaster."

"The nation’s top nutritional panel is recommending for the first time that Americans consider the impact on the environment when they are choosing what to eat, a move that defied a warning from Congress and, if enacted, could discourage people from eating red meat."

"Google and Apple are not the only big companies harnessing California's sunshine and wind to power their workplaces. Health care giant Kaiser Permanente will announce Wednesday that it has signed deals to buy electricity from a new wind farm to be built at the Altamont Pass, a vast solar plant in Southern California, and more than 100 smaller rooftop solar arrays to be installed at its hospitals, parking garages and medical offices, all of which will reduce its carbon emissions by 30 percent."

"Baby boys who are exposed in the womb to a chemical used in soft plastics may show small signs of altered genital development, according to new research published today."

"President Barack Obama is designating three new national monuments for protection as historic or ecologically significant sites, including the Pullman neighborhood in Chicago where African-American railroad workers won a historic labor agreement."

"Citigroup Inc said it would set aside $100 billion to fund environmental projects over the next decade, doubling the amount it had earmarked for such projects in 2007."