By STEVE TETREAULT

Stephens Washington Bureau

WASHINGTON - The Bush administration on Monday retracted a declaration from Energy Secretary Samuel Bodman that nuclear waste will remain stored at power plants until a Nevada repository is licensed.

Bodman "simply spoke too soon" in comments he made Friday during a meeting with reporters, according to an official familiar with negotiations within the administration on nuclear waste policy.

Bodman told reporters the Bush administration had ruled out creating temporary storage sites where thousands of tons of highly radioactive waste could be relocated from power plants in 39 states while work continues at Yucca Mountain.

A nuclear waste bill that is being written by the Energy Department and the White House would not seek permission from Congress for interim storage, Bodman said.

But officials said Monday that interim storage remains a possibility and the new legislation has not been finalized.

The official, who took an unusual step of calling reporters to discuss Bodman's comments, declined to be identified.

"The legislative package is not complete and discussions are ongoing, and Secretary Bodman simply spoke too soon," the official said.

Bodman had no immediate comment on Monday, but he is expected to talk about nuclear waste and interim storage during an appearance Wednesday before the House energy and water subcommittee.

Bodman said Friday that federal law prohibits the Energy Department from seeking to establish interim nuclear waste storage until a repository is licensed, and he was planning to follow that course.

"All our efforts will be going into the procurement of an operating license" for Yucca Mountain, Bodman said. "At that point in time we will make a decision whether we will take advantage of interim storage opportunities or not."

Nuclear industry officials who support the Yucca repository did a double-take at Bodman's remarks. Lobbyists for the Nuclear Energy Institute, the industry's main trade group, had declared swift relocation of nuclear waste from power plants to be their prime goal this year.

Ongoing delays within the Yucca program, coupled with a Nuclear Regulatory Commission licensing process that could stretch for years, could mean nuclear waste would not be removed from plant sites for the foreseeable future if the administration follows the course outlined by the secretary. If interim storage is not in the plans, "what is the purpose of having a bill in the first place?" said one industry official who sought a transcript of Bodman's remarks on Monday.

Pulling back comments from the energy secretary "is one of those things that doesn't happen very often," the official said.

There had been broad speculation that the forthcoming nuclear waste bill would seek to establish interim storage at the Savannah River site in South Carolina, the Idaho National Laboratory near Idaho Falls, or at the Nevada Test Site.