Mark Fox, chairman of the MHA Nation, speaks during the 2026 Williston Basin Petroleum Conference in Bismarck on May 20, 2026. (Photo by Michael Achterling/North Dakota Monitor)
NEW TOWN, N.D. (North Dakota Monitor) – The Mandan, Hidatsa and Arikara Nation is charting its energy future to focus on natural gas and data centers, with a long-term goal of eliminating dependence on the federal government.
The Fort Berthold Reservation, home to the MHA Nation, is a prolific oil-producing region, accounting for about 13% of North Dakota’s oil production, according to the latest figures.
But Mark Fox, chair of the MHA Nation, said that oil production won’t last forever.
“Gas has a longer lifetime than crude will have,” Fox said during remarks at this week’s Williston Basin Petroleum Conference in Bismarck. “We’re beginning to switch our focus to the usage of gas. I know many of you are doing the same, but nationally I think that’s where everything’s going.”
He said the tribe will focus its energy development on three major projects moving forward: Data centers, natural gas processing and crude oil storage.
While small communities across North Dakota are wrestling with the costs and benefits of data centers, Fox emphasized the need to attract that development to the tribal nation. He said Fort Berthold has excess power, water access, control over its own regulations and natural cooling that make it an ideal location for the facilities.
“These are the attributes that we have that make us a prime area for development,” Fox said.
While some natural gas may be used by the hyperscale data center campus Fox is seeking, the chairman said the MHA Nation also aspires to export liquefied natural gas, or LNG, all over the world. In addition, the tribal nation also seeks to export crops grown on tribal land, including within its new greenhouse that opened in December.
“We’re going to go back to our roots of growing food, not just for ourselves, but as an ability to share that with the world, to export food as well,” Fox said. “While we’re shipping LNGs to foreign markets that are demanding to get our LNG, you’re going to see cucumbers, alright, you’re going to see strawberries, you’re going to see lettuce, all these things that are going to go overseas.”
The potential for natural gas is also important for Rainbow Energy Center, which owns and operates Coal Creek Station and is working to attract data centers for an adjacent industrial park. CEO Stacy Tschider said during the conference that natural gas is going to increase in value as a way to power data centers, rather than being viewed as a nuisance that comes to the surface alongside crude oil.
“We need to start running towards this,” Tschider said. “What we’ve seen in the transition back in the ’70s and ’80s, when we transitioned to going to coal, we’re seeing that same opportunity in data centers.”
Though natural gas is increasing in value, Gov. Kelly Armstrong hammered home the importance of pursuing enhanced oil recovery to increase the amount of crude oil that can be extracted from the Bakken and other formations under North Dakota.
“We’ve only tapped 15% of the Bakken and Three Forks. The other 85% is still trapped in the rock,” Armstrong said. “We need this to succeed, not only for our state’s prosperity and to keep energy affordable, but also for our national security.”
Even as MHA Nation focuses on new areas, the tribal nation isn’t giving up on crude oil, the source of most of the tax revenue collected from the oil and gas industry. Fox proclaimed a goal of expanding crude oil storage on Fort Berthold Reservation, like the Strategic Petroleum Reserve, to help better withstand volatile price swings.
“We have the oil under our feet. Why should all the strategic petroleum reserves be down along the Gulf Coast? We should be participating in that,” Fox said.
The chairman said the revenue that has come from energy, and oil in particular, has allowed MHA to transform its economy from one that had been focused on agriculture, government services and gambling. Today the nation has rebuilt its infrastructure, constructed new schools and community centers, expanded community playgrounds, daycare and housing, and is working to open a second casino, Fox said.
But Fox’s long-term goal is more grand. He wants to end the MHA Nation’s dependence on the federal government, which can be traced back two centuries to when the United States began expanding west of the Mississippi River. Fox said the U.S. reduced the tribe’s land holdings and put tribal citizens into small plots of land that could not be used economically.
“They violated treaties. They took the land,” Fox said.
He said every tribal nation struggles with that dependence. But he hopes the MHA Nation, with 18,000 enrolled members, will be able to leverage energy and its natural resources to change that.
“Dependency is what keeps us down, and what we’re going to do is we’re going to go ahead and get up on our feet,” Fox said. “We’re going to build into the future what we need to thrive.”
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