Sea level rise scenarios in a changing climate. Learning from the past to predict the future

Geological investigations of Holocene (last 12 ka) sea-level stands represent a crucial contribution to quantify any possible post-industrial (i.e., last 150 years) acceleration in sea-level rise and provide new constrains into the effects of on-going global change on the coastal areas. In particular, definition of both the pattern and the magnitude of the land vertical motions is controlled by the isostatic adjustment along the global coastlines. We present here the results of a number of recent studies that were carried out along the coast of north and south America and of the Mediterranean Sea. These data allowed quantifying the recent acceleration in sea-level rise and to define future scenarios of coastal inundation along the global coastlines.