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Global emissions of carbon dioxide were at a record high in 2011 and are likely to take a similar jump in 2012, scientists reported Sunday — the latest indication that efforts to limit such emissions are failing.

Emissions continue to grow so rapidly that an international goal of limiting the ultimate warming of the planet to 3.6 degrees, established three years ago, is on the verge of becoming unattainable, said researchers affiliated with the Global Carbon Project.

Josep G. Canadell, a scientist in Australia who leads that tracking program, said Sunday in a statement that salvaging the goal, if it can be done at all, “requires an immediate, large and sustained global mitigation effort.”

A group of GOP House energy leaders advised Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius to exercise caution in a possible study on the health impacts of natural-gas drilling.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is considering examining a potential link between hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, and drinking water contamination.

Fueled by global warming, polar ice sheets in Greenland and Antarctica are now melting three times faster than they did in the 1990s, a new scientific study says.

So far, that's only added about half an inch to rising sea levels, not as bad as some earlier worst case scenarios. But the melting's quicker pace, especially in Greenland, has ice scientists worried.

Led by Dr. David O. Carpenter, Director of the Institute for Health and the Environment at the University at Albany’s School of Public Health, a number of health experts launched a new initiative, Concerned Health Professionals of New York, to outline the health risks of fracking and to renew their call for an independent, comprehensive Health Impact Assessment.

The health experts in Albany spoke on behalf of the broad medical and scientific community in New York State, where hundreds of medical professionals and scientists have been outspoken about concerns that fracking poses a threat to public health.

Thawing permafrost covering almost a quarter of the northern hemisphere could "significantly amplify global warming" at a time when the world is already struggling to reign in rising greenhouse gases, a U.N. report said on Tuesday.

The warning comes as United Nations climate negotiations enter a second day, with the focus on the Kyoto Protocol - a legally-binding emissions cap that expires this year and remains the most significant international achievement in the fight against global warming. Countries are hoping to negotiate an extension to the pact that runs until at least 2020.

Some frustrated residents and anti-fracking activists are finding new names to call the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) -- "Don't Expect Protection," "Department of Energy Production" -- according to Dana Dolney of ShaleTest, a nonprofit that provides free air and water quality testing for low-income residents near natural gas wells.

The department is taking heat for providing what critics see as incomplete water quality test results to property owners who are concerned about pollution from nearby fracking operations. Withholding such information, the critics say, could endanger residents' health.