CHARLESTON, W.Va. -- The Obama administration is starting over in its re-examination of a key mountaintop-removal mining regulation.

A preliminary public comment period on the matter will push back any proposed changes in the law until at least early 2011.

Interior Department lawyers notified a federal judge in Washington, D.C., that they hope later this month to publish an "advance notice of proposed rulemaking" to seek new input on possible changes to the federal stream "buffer zone" rule.

Obama officials had made reversing a Bush administration weakening of the buffer zone rule a central part of their effort to "take unprecedented steps" to reduce the environmental effects of mountaintop removal.

But a federal judge already threw out Interior's effort to throw out the Bush changes without any public involvement. In response, agency officials decided to start a new rulemaking with an advance notice, rather than by publishing proposed changes for public comment.

Glenda Owens, acting director of Interior's Office of Surface Mining Reclamation and Enforcement, said her agency does not have a schedule for publishing a final rule.

"Without knowing the nature and volume of any public comments on the anticipated proposed rule and the effect of any intervening events, it would be premature at this point to speculate on a timeline for completion of any rule," Owens said in a court affidavit filed Friday.

Environmental groups said they were concerned that the Obama administration is stalling any action by OSM at a time when the coal industry is already pressuring for the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency to drop its increased scrutiny of mountaintop removal.

CHARLESTON, W.Va. -- The Obama administration is starting over in its re-examination of a key mountaintop-removal mining regulation.

A preliminary public comment period on the matter will push back any proposed changes in the law until at least early 2011.

Interior Department lawyers notified a federal judge in Washington, D.C., that they hope later this month to publish an "advance notice of proposed rulemaking" to seek new input on possible changes to the federal stream "buffer zone" rule.

Obama officials had made reversing a Bush administration weakening of the buffer zone rule a central part of their effort to "take unprecedented steps" to reduce the environmental effects of mountaintop removal.

But a federal judge already threw out Interior's effort to throw out the Bush changes without any public involvement. In response, agency officials decided to start a new rulemaking with an advance notice, rather than by publishing proposed changes for public comment.

Glenda Owens, acting director of Interior's Office of Surface Mining Reclamation and Enforcement, said her agency does not have a schedule for publishing a final rule.

"Without knowing the nature and volume of any public comments on the anticipated proposed rule and the effect of any intervening events, it would be premature at this point to speculate on a timeline for completion of any rule," Owens said in a court affidavit filed Friday.

Environmental groups said they were concerned that the Obama administration is stalling any action by OSM at a time when the coal industry is already pressuring for the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency to drop its increased scrutiny of mountaintop removal.

"The Department of Interior is spinning its wheels, leaving this Bush-era rule in place while Appalachia's mountains, streams and communities continue to be destroyed," said Mary Anne Hitt, deputy director of the Sierra Club's Beyond Coal Campaign.

The rule in question, issued in 1983 by the Reagan administration, generally prohibited mining activities within 100 feet of perennial and intermittent streams. Coal operators could obtain waivers, but only if they could show that their operations would not damage water quality or quantity.

But OSM and various state regulators never applied the buffer-zone rule to valley-fill waste piles, so hundreds of miles of streams were buried by waste rock and dirt. After a federal court ruled in 1999 that it did apply to valley fills, government regulators and coal lobbyists started trying to eliminate the rule.

In December, OSM issued a final rule change that exempted valley fills and similar waste dumps, such as slurry impoundments, from the 100-foot stream buffer. A companion rule required operators to minimize these fills and consider alternatives for waste disposal. Before finalizing its changes, the Bush administration had at least three public-comment periods and conducted a detailed environmental study. On that study alone, OSM received more than 43,000 public comments.

In late April, Interior Secretary Ken Salazar announced he wanted to reverse the changes, saying the Bush rule "simply doesn't pass muster with respect to adequately protecting water quality and stream habitat that communities rely on in coal country."

U.S. District Judge Henry H. Kennedy ruled, though, that the new administration could not simply throw out the Bush rule changes without going through the formal rulemaking process, including public comment.

The National Mining Association had opposed Salazar's effort to avoid public involvement in reversing the Bush changes to the buffer zone rule. Association spokeswoman Carol Raulston said Monday that doesn't necessarily mean her group thinks the advance notice planned by OSM is necessary.

"Maybe the administration sees this as a way to sort of clear the air before they propose changes to the rule," Raulston said. "But we were merely making the point that this should at least have some sort of public involvement and comment."

Reach Ken Ward Jr. at kw...@wvgazette.com or 304-348-1702.