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In 1957, the First English Evangelical Lutheran Church purchased a 21-acre parcel of land in a canyon along the banks of Mill Creek in the Angeles National Forest. The Church operated a campground known as Lutherglen on the property, which included a dining hall, two bunkhouses, a caretaker's lodge, an outdoor chapel, and a footbridge across the creek. In July 1977, a forest fire denuded approximately 3,860 acres of the watershed area upstream from Lutherglen. On February 9 and 10, 1978, a storm dropped eleven inches of rain in the watershed, causing Mill Creek to overflow its banks, flood Lutherglen, and destroy its buildings. In January 1979, the County of Los Angeles adopted Interim Ordinance No. 11,855, which provided that a person shall not construct, reconstruct, place or enlarge any building or structure within the outer boundary lines of the interim flood protection area located in Mill Creek Canyon. The ordinance was adopted because the County determined it was required for the immediate preservation of the public health and safety, and it was extended several times. A little more than a month after the ordinance was adopted, the Church filed a complaint in Los Angeles County Superior Court alleging that Ordinance No. 11,855 denied the Church all use of Lutherglen and seeking damages for loss of use under each count. The defendants moved to strike the portions of the complaint alleging that the ordinance denied all use of Lutherglen. The Superior Court granted the motion to strike. The California Court of Appeal affirmed, and the California Supreme Court denied review. The Church appealed to the United States Supreme Court, which noted probable jurisdiction.

In 2015, the Environmental Protection Agency promulgated the Clean Power Plan rule addressing carbon dioxide emissions from existing coal- and natural-gas-fired power plants under Section 111(d) of the Clean Air Act. The rule identified three building blocks as the best system of emission reduction, including generation shifting from coal-fired plants to natural gas plants and from both to renewable sources. EPA projected that the rule would reduce coal's share of national electricity generation from 38% in 2014 to 27% by 2030, impose billions in compliance costs, raise electricity prices, retire dozens of coal plants, and eliminate tens of thousands of jobs. The Supreme Court stayed the Clean Power Plan in 2016. After a change in presidential administrations, EPA in 2019 repealed the Clean Power Plan, concluding that generation shifting exceeded its statutory authority, and replaced it with the Affordable Clean Energy rule, which relied solely on heat rate improvements at individual plants. Dozens of parties, including twenty-seven States, and private parties challenged the repeal and the ACE rule in the D.C. Circuit. The Court of Appeals held that EPA's repeal rested on a mistaken reading of the Clean Air Act and vacated both the repeal and the ACE rule. Following another change in administrations, EPA moved to partially stay the D.C. Circuit's mandate as to the Clean Power Plan while considering new rulemaking. The court granted the stay. Westmoreland Mining Holdings LLC, The North American Coal Corporation, and several States then petitioned for certiorari, which the Supreme Court granted.

Citizens for a Better Environment, an association of individuals interested in environmental protection, sued Steel Company, a small manufacturing company located in Chicago, alleging that Steel Company had failed since 1988 to complete and submit the annual hazardous-chemical inventory forms and toxic-chemical release forms required by the Emergency Planning and Community Right-To-Know Act of 1986. The forms must list the name and location of the facility, the name and quantity of each specified chemical on hand, the waste-disposal method employed, and the annual quantity of toxic chemicals released into each environmental medium, with inventory forms due each March 1 and release forms due each July 1. In 1995 the association sent the required 60-day notice to Steel Company, the EPA Administrator, and Illinois authorities, accurately alleging that Steel Company had never filed the required forms. Upon receiving the notice, Steel Company filed all of the overdue forms with the appropriate agencies. The EPA took no enforcement action, and after the waiting period expired the association filed its complaint in federal district court. The complaint, brought on behalf of the association and its members, sought a declaratory judgment that Steel Company had violated EPCRA, authorization for periodic inspections of Steel Company's facility and records at Steel Company's expense, an order compelling Steel Company to provide the association with copies of all compliance reports submitted to the EPA, civil penalties of $25,000 per day for each violation, and an award of the association's investigation and litigation costs including reasonable attorney and expert witness fees. The district court agreed with Steel Company on both points and dismissed the complaint. The United States Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit reversed, and the Supreme Court granted certiorari to resolve a conflict with the Sixth Circuit's decision in a factually indistinguishable case.

Laidlaw Environmental Services acquired a hazardous waste incinerator facility in Roebuck, South Carolina in 1986 that included a wastewater treatment plant. Shortly thereafter, it obtained an NPDES permit effective January 1, 1987 authorizing limited discharges of pollutants including mercury into the North Tyger River. Laidlaw repeatedly exceeded the permit limits, violating the mercury discharge limit on 489 occasions between 1987 and 1995. On April 10, 1992, Friends of the Earth and Citizens Local Environmental Action Network sent Laidlaw a 60-day notice letter of their intent to file a citizen suit under the Clean Water Act. On June 9, 1992, the South Carolina Department of Health and Environmental Control reached a settlement with Laidlaw requiring payment of a $100,000 civil penalty. On June 12, 1992, FOE filed its federal citizen suit seeking declaratory and injunctive relief plus civil penalties. After a bench trial the District Court found the violations, imposed a $405,800 penalty, awarded litigation costs to FOE, and denied injunctive relief because Laidlaw had achieved substantial compliance since August 1992. The Fourth Circuit assumed without deciding that FOE initially had standing but held that the case had become moot because civil penalties payable to the government would not redress any injury FOE had suffered. The Supreme Court granted certiorari; after the Fourth Circuit decision but before argument the entire Roebuck facility was permanently closed, dismantled, and placed for sale with all discharges permanently ceased.