Partly agree with @Kenneth M Towe that harmonizing the mitigation of an inaccurately predicted effect what drives different changes by regions is not easy. The largest polluter pulled out from the Paris agreement; it also won't help in harmonization since the rationale of common efforts questioned.
a.) In spite of these, there are some well known, evidenced, high impact issues easier to harmonize. One of the problems is the rising sea level and its effects on high population density, low sited shorelines, islands. The origin of the complication is the same, and the stake is high (The Netherlands, Singapour, vast areas in India, US coastlines, etc.).
For example, establishing a knowledge center, where the efforts of the affected countries and regions are available, predictions of sea level rise introduced, a network of professionals mapped, and the stakeholders' access ensured would be a great tool for harmonization. As well as international conferences on the topic.
b.) Another hot potato, high stake issue is the climate migration. In the case of sea level rise, the solutions can be different and independent, but the climate migration affects a lot of countries, and the harmonized action would be way more beneficial than the individual efforts.
Maybe we could identify more together and find other ways to harmonize goals and measures. I am keen on collaborating; it is a very reach topic.
Most ice caps are melting and there is now a measurable sea level rise, however, I am not aware of a concrete model on climate change / sea level rise but will say that the models that seem more accurate are predicting a more rapid sea level rise (enough said).
The real issue is the choices that we as humans are making and when faced with sea level rise we have two choices: 1. Adapt or 2. Retreat. We as humans are congregating along coastlines, these populations are increasing exponentially, and the poorest of our populations live in the worst possible locations.
There are many events that have dramatically affected the populous of the Earth, today we are just starting to correlate many of these events, and to be quite honest, we are not ready if those events were to reoccur. The truth is that we can't predict the future but we can research the past and what happened in the past will more than likely happen again. With that said, if you do nothing but review the ice core data over the last 15K years you will see huge temperature swings and corresponding sea level changes.
If we desire to have resilient communities along coastlines then we need to approach this problem from a different angle. For example, the Netherlands is now using a 10,000 year return period for planning against North Sea hazards and as such they must consider sea level rise as part of their design criteria.
Kenneth - Thanks for the leg up. Totally agree on the CO2 comment, if the predictions are correct, we are beyond the tipping point, and carbon sequestration with have little to no affect other than spending lots of money.
Mother Nature keeps the Earth in balance but she operates on a much longer timeline than we humans. One of her supposed tools is the thermohaline conveyor that distributes heat across the Earth, and in theory, as the salinity levels drop the conveyors stop which then creates thermal stratification across the planet. You will have extreme temperatures along the equator and extreme cooling at the poles which builds the ice sheets but this takes hundreds or thousands of years. The reality is that the last 500 years or so have been one of the calmest climatic periods on record (per ice cor data) and we have grown soft.
Some of the work that the Holocene Working Group is developing is rewriting the history as we have known it, their research is supporting prior work by Firestone on the Younger Dryas Event, it is explaining other climate change events from ~2,500 BC, and even the dark ages starting around 500 AD. All of these events triggered dramatic climate changes, probably millions of humans died, and to think we are worried about a few inches of sea level rise; that should be the least of our concerns.
We need to stop acting as if our climate is some placid never-ending sea of calm and realize that there is only one thing consistent in life - change. In other words, if we start planning for the eventual extreme event, then the concept of climate change or sea level rise is much easier to tackle.
Kenneth I saw the map and documents, good info - I will agree that using renewable energy resources is smart as it seems to be more sustainable, while reducing CO2 emissions but the whole concept of carbon sequestration and geo-engineering reminds me of a book I read as a kid called "I know an old lady who swallowed a fly". Some would contend that we are already geo-engineering via contrails and some conspiracy theorist belief we are including additives such as aluminum to the jet fuel to create a global cooling affect.
We are getting off subject a bit but the reality is that we need to change our strategies and tactics to survive on this place we call Earth and one of the larger questions we have side stepped is population growth. Beyond external threats, population growth is the biggest threat to humanity as the current rate of growth is not sustainable and if we end up with climate anomalies that affects food production, then we will see millions die from starvation.
We need to approach this problem from a more holistic approach.