New research has confirmed that a half-degree increase in the planet's average temperature is far from inconsequential. It would trigger additional sea level rise, flooding coastal regions and islands currently inhabited by some 5 million people, according to up-to-date sea level and storm surge prediction models used to gauge the impact of three different global warming scenarios -- warming of 1.5, 2 and 2.5 degrees Celsius. "People think the Paris Agreement is going to save us from harm from climate change, but we show that even under the best-case climate policy being considered today, many places will still have to deal with rising seas and more frequent coastal floods," lead study author D.J. Rasmussen, a member of the Impact Lab and an environmental policy grad student at Princeton's Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs, said.