France has become the first industrialised nation to ratify the UN climate deal that nations signed in Paris last year. President François Hollande finalised the process on Wednesday, quipping that “signing is good, ratifying is better”. So far, 17 states have ratified the deal, but these are mainly small island and low-lying coastal states that have minimal emissions. Hollande called on other European countries to follow France’s lead by the end of the year. Climate Home, Reuters and Associated Press also covered the news.

According to a new report by the International Renewable Energy Agency (IRENA), the average cost of electricity generated by solar and wind energy could fall by up to 59% between 2015 and 2025 if the right policies are in place. Since 2009, the price of solar PV has fallen by 80% and wind turbine prices by 30-40%. IRENA says this fall can continue if governments put the right conditions in place.

The discovery of “bright spots” amid the world’s coral reefs have provided a rare good news stories for conservationists, where concern is mounting about the impacts of bleaching, overfishing and pollution. These are spots where the reefs are flourishing against the odds and were typically discovered in the Pacific Ocean. Researchers also identified “dark spots” that were not faring well, which included sites in undisturbed or remote locations. The researchers conducted 6,000 reef studies from 46 countries around the world. Reuters and Nature also cover the news.

New research from NASA has underscored the scale of the Aliso Canyon methane leak that affected an area of Los Angeles late last year. A satellite-based instrument was able to identify and isolate the leak from space, the first time this has ever been accomplished for a single-source emission of methane. “For the first time — to our knowledge, anyway — we’ve been able to see the methane plume from space,” said one of the researchers, NASA’s David Thompson. The Hindu also covered the findings. Carbon Brief examined the scale of the leak at the time it happened.

A survey by the Energy Institute has revealed that the “overwhelming majority” of energy professionals believe the UK’s energy system will be negatively impacted by a Brexit. The report quotes Professor Jim Skea, who said: “In terms of securing energy supplies, renewable energy development, climate change and sustainability, and air quality, about four times as many respondents anticipate negative effects. The single exception to this pattern was oil and gas production, where positive and negative views were broadly balanced.” Carbon Brief has been tracking energy and climate views on the EU referendum.

Cheap petrol has driven a surge in worldwide consumption, according to the International Energy Agency (IEA). Car owners are now driving more and for longer, according to the monthly report. It added that the surplus crude accumulated over the past two years will take time to work through. A separate article in the Times says that cheap petrol means more efficient vehicles are being spurned for carbon intensive trucks and SUVs.

The international oil industry is set to cut spending on exploration and development by $1 trillion, thanks to the recent drop in oil prices, according to new research by Wood Mackenzie. Investment in oil and gas projects between 2015 and 2020 will be 22% lower than expected, the group said, while a further $300bn will be cut from exploration in areas such as the Arctic. The Telegraph points out that the news comes at a time when oil prices had once again slipped below $50 a barrel, with confidence slipping ahead of the EU referendum. Bloomberg and the Financial Times also cover the story.

Carbon capture and storage is unlikely to be the saviour of the coal industry, says Gary Ellem from the University of Newcastle. This is because it has become less cost competitive as the price of renewables has dropped, and advances in batteries are making it easier to store their electricity, so the need for coal’s caseload supply is diminishing. Meanwhile, BECCS may harness CCS technology in the future, but this points to a future of biomass energy rather than coal.

As the board of the Green Climate Fund prepares to meet later this month to advance progress on the distribution of climate funds, Climate Home’s editor Ed King lays out eight questions that they should answer. These include how the UN-backed bank will complement the Paris deal, and whether it should start taking risks.

A team of scientists have mapped the changes in elevation of the Greenland ice sheet, using satellite data from CryoSat-2 and a regional climate model. During 2011-2014, Greenland mass loss averaged 269  billion tonnes per year, with surface melting driving most of the difference from year to year. Five glaciers known to be thinning, and which constitute less than 1% of Greenland’s area, contributed more than 12% of the ice loss.