Climate and energy choices this decade will influence how high sea levels rise for hundreds of years.

If we keep our current carbon path
(3°C global warming)

(3°C warming)

Image Landsat/Copernicus

If we sharply cut carbon pollution
(1.5°C global warming)

(1.5°C warming)

Image Landsat/Copernicus

These images show projected future sea levels at Universidade Federal do Rio de Janeiro in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil due to human-caused global warming under two different scenarios. Climate and energy choices in the coming few decades could set the destination, but the timing of rise is more difficult to project: these sea levels may take hundreds of years to be fully realized.