Wal-Mart Stores Inc. is walking away from a 200-acre, $1.6 million deal from which it planned to build the second largest distribution center in Central Florida, a $50-million, 1.2 million-sf complex on the outskirts of this Lake County city, 45 miles northwest of Downtown Orlando.

The Florida Department of Environmental Protection killed the deal by decreeing it needed a year to test the dirt for contaminants that might pose a public health risk. Wal-Mart says it can't wait that long. The retailer had planned to have the center up and running by 2002.

The state became involved in the deal only because the land is in the middle of the city's sewage sprayfield, away from any immediate residential population but strategically near the Florida Turnpike and a proposed interchange at County Road 470 not far from the commercially-heavy US 27 Interchange.