According to the Associated Press, the House Conservation Subcommittee called for the measure to be sent to a study committee after the legislative session ended for the year.

The bill, formally known as Senate Bill 0577/House Bill 291 and sponsored by state representative Mike McDonald, would have banned any mining-altering ridgelines more than 2000 feet above sea level.

However, it would have excluded mines with current permits.

The news service reported on Tuesday that representative Richard Floyd made a motion to defer voting on the grounds that more information on the measure was needed.

Other versions of the bill reportedly came before legislators once before in 2008.

Sponsor McDonald reportedly argued that lawmakers already received the needed information to move on a decision regarding high-elevation mining.

Geo Environmental Associates president Barry Thacker was present outside the hearing room with many others holding signs reading “Legalize Coal”

“We're here to rally for our jobs,” he told the AP.

“We just don't understand how folks in this type of an environment would want to take our jobs from us.”

While many opponents argued that the state didn’t practice mountaintop removal mining, Thacker told the news service that mining being performed now was on land that was strip mined four to five decades ago.

“Coal companies are now going back and reclaiming that land using the forestry reclamation approach, which is that we plant trees on it,” Thacker said.

“It will eventually impact and cause most, if not all, coal mining in the state to leave.

“And we need coal mining.”

Tennessee produces about 1% of the nation’s coal supply.