Market Snapshot: North Dakota

Market Snapshot: North Dakota

50 states in 50 weeks – This series leverages our market intelligence database to bring you powerful AE industry insights. Each week, we highlight a new state in green while previously featured states fade to a lighter green. Next, let’s look at North Dakota.

North Dakota Economic Performance and Outlook Grade*: B+

• Economy: D
• Population: D+
• Workforce: A+
• Financial/Fiscal Health: A

* Overall grade is assigned based on a curve (relative to all states’ performances).

Fueled by the Bakken oil boom and a low cost of living, North Dakota boasts the country’s second-highest labor force participation and second-lowest unemployment rates, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. While the state is sparsely populated, the University of Virginia’s Weldon Cooper Center forecasts that only Utah, Idaho, and Texas will have faster population growth this decade. The Peace Garden State tops CNBC’s business friendliness ratings, Truth in Accounting’s fiscal health assessments, and U.S. News and World Report’s infrastructure rankings. North Dakota is the third-largest U.S. oil producer behind Texas and New Mexico. Despite an oil tax revenue dip due to slower output, the state government is projected to end the current 2025-2027 biennium with a surplus. With agricultural exports a backbone of the state’s economy, tariffs could hit North Dakota particularly hard. See below for regional highlights in North Dakota:

• Northwest North Dakota: With the region’s power demand projected to double and oil companies handling rising flows of natural gas from Bakken oilfields, major proposed projects include WBI Energy’s 375-mile natural gas pipeline eastward from the Bakken, Basin Electric Power Cooperative’s $4 billion power plant near Williston that would be the state’s largest, and Cerilon’s pair of $3.2 billion plants to convert natural gas to diesel fuel, lubricants, and other products.
• Fargo: The metropolitan region’s labor force has grown at three times the national rate in the last 20 years, and the economy stands to benefit from a $3.2 billion flood control project. Checkr ranks Fargo as the country’s top city for Gen Z professionals based on employment, affordability, and social life. (Bismarck ranks fourth and Grand Forks sixteenth.)
• Bismarck: With coal responsible for more than half of the state’s electricity production—compared to 20% in the country—power companies are exploring controversial carbon capture projects outside Bismarck. Minnkota Power Cooperative’s proposed $2 billion Project Tundra project would retrofit a coal plant with carbon capture technology, and state regulators have approved the state’s portion of an $8 billion project by Summit Carbon Solutions that would transport carbon dioxide by pipeline from 57 Midwest ethanol plants and capture the emissions in sequestration wells northwest of the state capital.

For sector-specific data and insights for North Dakota or questions about our market intelligence and research services, call/text Rafael Barbosa at 972-266-4955 or email [email protected].