Plant Engineer

Vicinity Energy is North America’s largest provider of district energy solutions, offering low carbon energy to most of the iconic buildings you see in the skylines of Boston, Cambridge, Philadelphia, Baltimore and many other cities in the US. As a member of the communities we serve, all of us at Vicinity understand the critical role we play in reducing the impacts of climate change and being a leader in decarbonization. We are committed to net zero and eliminating our reliance on fossil fuels, but we need the best and the brightest minds on our team to help us reach our goal, not only for us as a company, but for our customers, our communities, and our planet.

Summary

The Plant Engineer will be involved in all aspects of site engineering with respect to the day-to-day activities of the operations and maintenance departments. The Plant Engineer will also be involved in capital and O&M project management, parts research and procurement where applicable, RCM program implementation, preventative and corrective maintenance tracking as directed by the Regional Director of Engineering.

Plant Engineer will support site engineering, operations, and maintenance staff for all disciplines. The position involves system and equipment troubleshooting, root cause analysis, thermal performance monitoring, and defining/managing outage work and maintenance priorities. Disciplines include: boilers, power plant aux systems, steam turbine/rotating equipment, I&C controls, and electrical.  Other duties may include plant chemistry and water plant support. 

The Plant Engineer will develop and refine preventative maintenance plans and task descriptions to streamline maintenance execution. The work at times may involve written and verbal contact with vendors and customers. This role is technical in nature with regards to parts procurement and outage planning and also requires customer service skills to deal with suppliers.   

This is a full-time exempt position located in Philadelphia, PA.

Responsibilities

• Provide technical support to plant operations and maintenance.
• Provide engineering management of capital improvement projects including design, bid, and construction and ensure budgetary guidelines and contractual guarantees are met.
• Support combustion turbine, steam turbine, and boiler outages.
• Interface with industry technical experts for all plant systems and equipment.
• Works with the maintenance, operations, and engineering departments to review planned maintenance and plant engineering projects with regards to procurement of materials and services.
• Track and monitor overall plant performance including but not limited to the combustion and steam turbines and HRSG. Identify, trend, and analyze plant heat rate and plant efficiencies.
• Assists in preparing long-term outage plans.
• Reviews critical asset needs and existing preventative maintenance tasks and updates procedures and plans.
• Utilizes appropriate software for CMMS.
• Responsible for tracking forced outages, loss of generation, and conducting root cause analysis on the cause of failure. This includes any necessary reporting requirements; internal and external.
• Assists in the investigation of plant problems, incidents, accidents, unusual events, and provide analyses, recommendations, reports, and appropriate follow-up plans.
• Develop and administer contracts and work scope for external contractors to ensure maximum efficiency in the use of plant and contractor personnel.

Qualifications and Experience

• B.S. in Engineering or equivalent 4-year technical degree required.
• 3-5 years’ experience working as an engineer.
• Experience with plant distributed control systems preferred.
• Experience in combustion turbine and steam turbine maintenance practices and procedures preferred.
• Knowledge of instrumentation and controls.
• Strong communication skills to help coordinate O&M team activities.
• Excellent time management skills and the ability to problem solve.
• Must be highly organized with excellent attention to detail.

Physical Requirements 

• Must submit to company required pre-employment drug screening and physical exam.
• Must possess a driver’s license in good standing in order to operate a company vehicle.
• Must be capable of wearing protective equipment in the performance of some duties (e.g. hard hats, safety glasses, air masks, ear protection, chemical suits, hot gloves and high voltage protective equipment, etc.).
• Ability to hear and understand audible alarms, detect changes in noise levels of rotating equipment and portable radio communication.
• Ability to lift heavy equipment and carry materials up and down stairs with the capacity of lifting up to and including 70 pounds, ability to climb ladders and work in hot or cold environments as needed.

EQUAL EMPLOYMENT OPPORTUNITY POLICY STATEMENT Vicinity North America is an Equal Employment Opportunity (EEO) employer. It is the policy of the Company to provide equal employment opportunities to all qualified applicants without regard to race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, age, protected veteran or disabled status, or genetic information.