Live Mint: India's Solar Plan Flouts Global Trade Rules, Says WTO

A World Trade Organization dispute settlement panel has struck a blow to India’s solar power program, ruling that New Delhi violated global trade rules by imposing domestic content restrictions on the production of solar cells and modules as part of its National Solar Mission.

The ruling comes three years after the U.S. launched a dispute against India at the WTO, complaining that its domestic content requirement measures violated core norms of trade-related investment provisions, national treatment provisions for treating imported products on a par with domestically manufactured products, and financial subsidy rules.

GreenBiz: Apple Is the First U.S. Tech Company to Issue Green Bonds

Apple frequently uses debt rather than its flush cash coffers to finance corporate initiatives, such as stock repurchase programs -- it makes sense to do so for tax reasons.

But the company’s latest appeal to the public debt markets includes another “first” for Apple and the tech industry at large: Apple is issuing $1.5 billion in green bonds to pay for a wide range of environmental initiatives. The issue is the largest ever to be undertaken by a U.S. company.

Bloomberg: Vivint Shareholders Overwhelmingly Approve SunEdison Acquisition

Vivint Solar Inc. shareholders voted to approved the board’s plan to be bought by SunEdison Inc. in a transaction valued at about $1.9 billion.

Shareholders led by Blackstone Group LP, which held 77 percent of Vivint Solar shares outstanding at the start of the year, approved the sale, with more than 100 million votes in favor and 101,000 against, the Lehi, Utah-based solar company said in a regulatory filing Wednesday.

Forbes: Southern Company Goes Long on Distributed Energy, Buys PowerSecure

Southern Company, the investor-owned electric utility based in Atlanta, said it would pay $431 million to buy PowerSecure International for arguably the most successful distributed energy companies in the United States.

The utility company, which operates regulated electric utilities in Alabama, Georgia, Mississippi and Florida, said that it would pay $18.75 per share in cash to acquire the Wake Forest, NC-based energy services company, which amounts to about a 90% premium over today’s closing price.

InsideClimate News: Exxon Digs In Against Shareholder Pressure to Address Climate Change

ExxonMobil has challenged a shareholder resolution that calls for the company to show how its business will be affected by the global commitment to dramatically slow global warming.

The resolution -- filed by the New York state comptroller's office and four co-filers -- also seeks an explanation of how Exxon will address those impacts. Exxon notified the Securities and Exchange Commission that it wants to block a vote on the proposal at its annual meeting in May. The fossil-fuel giant argued that it's unlikely that strict emissions restrictions will be imposed to meet the goal of holding global warming to less than 2 degrees Celsius that world governments agreed to in last year's Paris climate accord.