Duke Power Co. v. Carolina Environmental Study Group, Inc

In Duke Power Co. v. Carolina Environmental Study Group, Inc., 438 U.S. 59 (1978), the plaintiffs, a group of individuals living near a proposed nuclear powerplant, challenged the con stitutionality of the Price-Anderson Act, a statute that limited the plants liability in the case of a nuclear acci dent. The plaintiffs said that, without the Act, the de fendants would not build a nuclear plant. And the building of the plant would harm them, in part, by emitting non-natural radiation into their environment. Id., at 74. The Court found standing in part due to our general ized concern about exposure to radiation and the appre hension flowing from the uncertainty about the health and genetic consequences of even small emissions. Ibid. In Duke Power Co. v. Carolina Environmental Study Group, Inc., 438 U.S. 59, 98 S.Ct. 2620, 57 L.Ed.2d 595 (1978), private utilities could operate nuclear power plants and thus injure the plaintiffs even in the absence of liability limitation agreements executed by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission under the Price-Anderson Act. Plaintiffs had standing to challenge the NRC action, however, because the utilities probably would have stopped operating the plants in response to a cessation of the NRC's actions, since such operation would not initially have occurred "but for the enactment and implementation of the Price-Anderson Act." Id. at 78, 98 S.Ct. at 2633. The Court relied on Duke Power to find standing for consumer organizations challenging the legislative veto of the Federal Trade Commission's proposed used car rule, finding that " 'but for' the veto's intervention, the FTC's used car rule would have secured significant assistance and protection for the used car buyers that the organizations represent." Consumers Union of U.S., Inc. v. FTC, 691 F.2d 575, 577 (D.C.Cir.1982) (en banc), aff'd mem. 463 U.S. 1216, 103 S.Ct. 3556, 77 L.Ed.2d 1402 (1983). The Court held that all a plaintiff need prove to satisfy article III of the Constitution is "injury in fact and a substantial likelihood that the judicial relief requested will prevent or redress the claimed injury." Id. at 79, 98 S.Ct. at 2634. Although in some cases certain "prudential limitations" might bar suit, this two-prong test is all the Constitution requires. See id. at 79-81, 98 S.Ct. 2620.