By Amy Dalrymple | Editor
“Stripper wells really have been the fabric of American oil production for a century.” - Ron Ness, president of the North Dakota Petroleum Council, on why the tax break is important.
This oil well operated by Rim Operating, shown Sept. 2, 2026, is the oldest active stripper well in North Dakota. It was first drilled in 1954 and was certified as a stripper well in 1988. It has produced an average of 62 barrels of oil per day so far in 2026. The well continues to receive a tax break for low-producing wells despite exceeding the thresholds used in North Dakota and other top oil states. (By Kyle Martin/For the North Dakota Monitor)
By Jacob Orledge
More than one-third of North Dakota’s stripper wells that are exempt from half of the state’s oil tax would not qualify for that status in other major oil-producing states.
That’s because North Dakota defines a stripper well differently than those states do. North Dakota’s threshold for most wells is 35 barrels of oil per day, while other top oil states set that standard at 10 or 15 barrels per day.
North Dakota’s higher threshold allows more productive wells to qualify for the tax reduction.
Sam Bradley, a board member with the National Stripper Well Association, said 15 barrels a day is the “historic norm” in the industry for defining a stripper well.
North Dakota had 4,791 stripper wells producing more than 15 barrels of oil per day in May, more than one-third of all the state’s stripper wells.
An aerial view shows a data center situated near single-family homes in Northern Virginia. The backlash against data centers has become a flashpoint in state and federal races across the country. (Photo by Nathan Howard/Getty Images)
By Alex Brown
In the course of a single election cycle, the backlash against data centers has grown from an issue at local planning commission and city council meetings to become a flashpoint in state and federal races across the country.
Candidates who once touted data centers as an economic boon have backtracked, and voters in at least three dozen cities, counties and townships will consider ballot measures in November that could ban data centers in their communities. Analysts say the opposition to data centers has come from Republican and Democratic voters alike.
“The people are speaking, and they’re speaking in one voice in opposition to this infrastructure,” said Tatishe Nteta, provost professor of political science at UMass Amherst.
Gas and diesel prices in Indiana on Sept. 17, 2026. (Photo by Niki Kelly/Indiana Capital Chronicle)
By Jacob Fischler
The Trump administration’s order to allow import of Russian diesel violates a 2022 law banning Russian energy imports while the country’s war with Ukraine is ongoing, according to a bipartisan group of U.S. senators.
Following an Oct. 9 call between President Donald Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin, the U.S. Treasury Department’s Office of Foreign Assets Control lifted sanctions against the “import sale, delivery, offloading, or importation” of Russian diesel. Prices of diesel have skyrocketed in recent months during Trump’s war in Iran.
The administration did not consult with Congress before lifting the sanctions, which is required by the 2022 law, six senators said Sunday in a statement. They called on Trump to “immediately reverse course.”
EARLIER ND MONITOR NEWS AND COMMENTARY
FROM STATES NEWSROOM
A resident of a storm damaged apartment complex unloads his shovel on a pile of trash while cleaning out his apartment in Pensacola Beach several days after the landfall of Hurricane Isaias on October 11, 2026. (Dan Anderson for Alabama Reflector)
By Michael Moline
Some 120,000 power customers were still waiting for power restoration in Florida as of Monday afternoon, three days after Hurricane Isaias hit the Florida Panhandle, as momentum gathered behind the state’s disaster recovery.
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