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Abstract

Standing is a party’s right to bring a cause of action in court.  Establishing this right is an important threshold to be crossed, because without it the merits of a party’s claim cannot be heard.  To have standing, a party must at least meet the “case and controversy” limitation of Article III of the U.S. Constitution, which requires the party to show an injury that was caused by the defendant’s conduct, and the injury must be one that can be redressed by the court.  The process of applying these requirements has ample historical precedent, but is complicated by the fact that each is “susceptible to imprecise definition.”

Ethanol is a biofuel that uses corn as a primary ingredient and is blended with traditional petroleum-based gasoline.  For many years ethanol has been blended at a ratio of ten percent, approved for use in many types of combustion engines.  The EPA, in 2010, approved an increase in the ratio of ethanol to fifteen percent to meet additional renewable fuel standards imposed by the Energy Independence and Security Act of 2007.  In Grocery Manufacturers Ass’n v. EPA, three industry groups claimed that the increased blend of ethanol would cause injury to their group constituents due to higher costs through competition for limited supplies of corn, additional infrastructure requirements, and wear and tear on engine components.  The D.C. Circuit found each group failed to meet at least one standing requirement, preventing the merits of their injury claims from being heard.  The result of the court’s holding effectively denied significant industrial interests to challenge increasing ethanol use and the logic employed implicates a high bar for any industry to do so in the future.  This Note discusses why the court’s denial to hear the claims due to lack of standing was in error for two of the three industry groups by contracting the logic and principles of precedential authority.

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