Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/06pdf/05-1120.pdf
Page Number: 47

Cite as:  549 U. S. ____ (2007) 

9 

ROBERTS, C. J., dissenting 

diacy  utterly  toothless.   See  Defenders  of  Wildlife,  supra, 
at  565,  n. 2  (while  the  concept  of  “ ‘imminence’ ”  in  stand-
ing  doctrine  is  “somewhat  elastic,”  it  can  be  “stretched
beyond  the  breaking  point”).    “Allegations  of  possible 
future injury do not satisfy the requirements of Art. III.  A 
threatened  injury  must  be  certainly  impending  to  consti-
tute  injury  in  fact.”  Whitmore,  supra,  at  158.    (internal 
quotation marks omitted; emphasis added). 

III 

Petitioners’  reliance  on  Massachusetts’s  loss  of  coastal 
land  as  their  injury  in  fact  for  standing  purposes  creates 
insurmountable  problems  for  them  with  respect  to  causa-
tion and redressability.  To establish standing, petitioners
must  show  a  causal  connection  between  that  specific
injury  and  the  lack  of  new  motor  vehicle  greenhouse  gas
emission  standards,  and  that  the  promulgation  of  such 
standards would likely redress that injury.  As is often the 
case, the questions of causation and redressability overlap. 
See Allen, 468 U. S., at 753, n. 19 (observing that the two 
requirements  were  “initially  articulated  by  this  Court  as
two  facets  of  a  single  causation  requirement”  (internal 
quotation  marks  omitted)).    And  importantly,  when  a 
party  is  challenging  the  Government’s  allegedly  unlawful
regulation,  or  lack  of  regulation,  of  a  third  party,  satisfy-
ing  the  causation  and  redressability  requirements  be-
comes “substantially more difficult.”  Defenders of Wildlife, 
supra, at 562 (internal quotation marks omitted); see also 
Warth, supra, at 504–505. 

Petitioners view the relationship between their injuries
and EPA’s failure to promulgate new motor vehicle green-
house  gas  emission  standards  as  simple  and  direct:  Do-
mestic  motor  vehicles  emit  carbon  dioxide  and  other 
greenhouse  gases.    Worldwide  emissions  of  greenhouse 
gases  contribute  to  global  warming  and  therefore  also  to 
petitioners’  alleged  injuries.    Without  the  new  vehicle