On Feb. 2, 2007, the United Nations scientific panel studying climate change declared that the evidence of a wanning trend is "unequivocal" , and that human activity has "very likely" been thedriven force in that change over the last 50 years. The last report by 1the group, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, in 2001, had found that humanity had "likely" played a role. The addition of that single word " very" did more than reflectto mounting scientific evidence that the release of carbon dioxide 2and other heat-trapping gases from smokestacks, tailpipes andburning forests have played a central role in raising the average 3surface temperature of earth by more than 1 degree Fahrenheit 4in 1900. It also added new momentum to a debate that now seems 5to center less over that humans are warming the planet, but instead 6over what to do about it. In recent months, business groups havebanded together to make unprecedented calls to federal regulation of 7greenhouse gases. The subject had a red-carpet moment when former Vice President Al Gore's documentary, " An InconvenientTruth" , was rewarded an Oscar; and the Supreme Court made its 8first global warming-related decision, ruling 5 to 4 that theEnvironmental Protection Agency had not justified their position that 9it was not authorized to regulate carbon dioxide. The latest report from the climate panel predicted that the global temperature is likely to rise between 3. 5 and 8 degreesFahrenheit whether the carbon dioxide concentration in the 10atmosphere reaches twice the level of 1750. By 2100, sea levels are likely to rise between 7 and 23 inches, it said, and the changes now underway will continue for centuries to come.