Kraken Operating, LLC — Active Bakken Expander with 8 Cases Converging on a Single September Hearing

Docket & Locations

Kraken's active regulatory footprint spans McKenzie and Williams counties exclusively. All 8 pending cases are set for the September 23, 2026 hearing. On the McKenzie side, Case 33164 is a spacing-unit application covering the Foreman Butte-Bakken and Boxcar Butte-Bakken pools at Sections 1, 12, 13, and 24 of T.149N., R.102W., seeking authorization for 4 wells across 2,560 acres against a backdrop of 6 prior wells — not a blank slate. In Williams County, the docket is dominated by pooling cases: 4 cases target the Blue Ridge-Bakken Pool (Cases 33177, 33178, 33179, 33180) and 3 target the Little Muddy-Bakken Pool (Cases 33181, 33182, 33183). The Blue Ridge location at T.158–159N., R.100W. carries 36 prior wells, the densest existing footprint of any pending location in the bundle. Earlier in the pipeline, continued-pending cases include spacing-unit applications in the Squires-Bakken (Case 32825, Williams, 3 wells authorized, 2,560 acres, 10 prior wells) and Hebron/Bull Butte-Bakken (Case 32824, Williams, 3 wells authorized, 2,560 acres, 16 prior wells), plus pooling and field-extension cases in the Sheep Butte-Bakken and Winter Butte-Bakken pools of McKenzie County.

Portfolio

Kraken's well inventory totals 450 wells: 366 active, 378 producing now, and 11 plugged. The producing-now count exceeding the active count is a data nuance worth noting — it reflects the classification conventions used in ND reporting rather than any anomaly in operations. The operator's work-type footprint covers the full development stack: drilling rigs, frac crews, frac sand, new-pad dirt and construction, and water logistics and trucking — indicating Kraken either self-sources or actively contracts across every major service category rather than relying on a single integrated provider.

Recent Orders, Cases & Regulatory Momentum

Five orders were signed in a six-week window from June 9 to July 17, 2026. Order 35849 (July 17, McKenzie, Glass Bluff) was a Spacing Unit Modification. Order 34539 (July 8, McKenzie, Pronghorn) combined a Spacing Unit Modification with a Pool Redefinition — the most complex order type in the recent set. Order 35779 (June 15, Williams, Blue Ridge-Bakken) granted Commingling Authorization, directly relevant to the 4 Blue Ridge pooling cases now pending for September. Orders 35747 and 35748 (both June 9, Williams) established and amended spacing units in the Little Muddy-Bakken Pool — the same pool targeted by 3 of the September pooling cases. This sequencing — commingling and spacing establishment orders in June, followed immediately by pooling filings for the same pools — is a textbook land-locking sequence. Momentum metrics reinforce the picture: 8 high-probability cases, 4 wells already authorized, a win rate of 87%, and a ramp score of 12.0.

Convergence & Risk Flags

The portfolio-wide average progression probability sits at 99.7%, making Case 33014 (Winter Butte-Bakken, McKenzie, pooling, 4 wells authorized, 2,560 acres) a genuine outlier at 1.3% — the only case in the bundle where the model assigns near-certain non-progression. All other continued-pending cases carry probabilities of 98% or higher. The greenfield flag is set to true only for Case 33085 (Sheep Butte-Bakken field extension, McKenzie, 4 wells, 2,560 acres), making it the sole new-territory play in an otherwise infill-and-extension-dominated docket. The September 23 hearing concentration means a single adverse commission session could stall a large share of Kraken's near-term authorization pipeline simultaneously — the flip side of the batch-filing efficiency.

Hearing locations