The state water-quality agency will take another look at whether aluminum maker Alcoa's hydroelectric dams are hurting water quality on the Yadkin River.

Alcoa, which wants to renew its federal hydroelectric license, withdrew its request for a key state permit the day before Friday's deadline to issue or deny it.

The N.C. Division of Water Quality urged Alcoa Power Generating to withdraw its application after Stanly County, which opposes the license, filed a report last week describing contamination in Badin Lake. The lake is one of four Alcoa manages about 50 miles east of Charlotte.

By withdrawing and refiling the application Thursday, Alcoa gives the state up to an additional year to hash out whether its dams are hurting the Yadkin.

Political pressure has also mounted in recent weeks over a broader issue: whether a company that once employed hundreds at its Stanly County smelter, now largely closed, is still entitled to make electricity with a public resource and sell it elsewhere.

Gov. Mike Easley, legislators and neighboring counties have urged the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission to wait a year before giving Alcoa a new, 50-year hydroelectric license. The state permit, which would certify that operations don't harm water quality, has to be issued before the federal license can be renewed.

Questions raised by Stanly County, and a fluke in the permitting process, will result in more time to debate environmental and public policy issues on the Yadkin.

The state had already issued Alcoa its permit when opponents discovered in April that a required legal notice hadn't been published. The state reopened the permit for comment. In response, Stanly County filed reports last week that described contaminated sediment and an array of "significant environmental problems" at 5,300-acre Badin Lake. A report by Clemson University professor John Rodgers, a specialist in environmental toxicology, said Alcoa's dam operations influence those problems.

One report cited evidence of contaminated sediment at swim areas on the lake near Alcoa's old smelting plant, which produced tons of hazardous waste while it operated.

Testing for Stanly County showed more contamination than the state had found a decade earlier, said Robin Smith, assistant secretary of the N.C. Department of Environment and Natural Resources.

The state's concern, she said, is that there would not be enough time by Friday to resolve the discrepancies or consider other new information.

Alcoa's federal license expired April 30. It is operating on a temporary license.