Data Center Controls Engineer

Element Critical•Austin, TX

9h•Onsite

About The Position

Element Critical is seeking a Data Center Controls Engineer for its Facility Operations team. The role is based on-site in Austin, Texas, and reports to the Director of Facility Operations. The engineer is responsible for controls design standards, implementation, project management, and the maintenance of building electrical power management systems (EPMS), building automation systems (BAS), and building management systems (BMS) across the company’s data centers. The role develops processes and standards and works to create reliable, efficient controls that support Operations and customers. The position participates in a 24/7 operational support model, including a weekly rotating on-call schedule shared among participating on-site team members. Travel is expected up to approximately 40%.

Requirements

Bachelor's degree in Mechanical Engineering, Electrical Engineering, Systems Engineering, or equivalent practical experience.
Five years of experience in a data center or critical facility environment focused on commissioning mechanical systems and industrial controls.
Five years of experience with Building Management Systems, PLC programming, and SCADA architecture, including technologies such as Modbus, BACnet, and industrial networking.
Experience managing projects in a Design/Build delivery environment for mission-critical facilities, with a focus on cooling and mechanical automation.
Experience working with contractors and site safety teams to ensure commissioning activities align with construction schedules and safety protocols.
Ability to work in a 24/7 operational environment and participate in an on-call rotation.
Excellent communication skills.

Responsibilities

Collaborate with design and operations teams to develop and enforce automation logic that meets operational standards.
Coordinate with operations and engineering teams to troubleshoot complex control-loop issues, using third-party vendors and contractors as needed.
Support procurement activities, including requests for quotations and proposals, responses to requests for information, vendor proposal reviews, and submittal processing.
Attend project meetings, coordinate with project leaders, and report project status to management.
Visit data centers to troubleshoot issues and supervise third-party vendor work for compliance with scope, design, and applicable local codes.
Create and maintain sequences of operation (SOOs) and documentation of existing controls infrastructure.
Assemble and maintain libraries of instrumentation and controls design documents, submittals, as-builts, and operations and maintenance manuals.
Maintain inventories of controls equipment and records of vendors, contracts, warranties, licenses, entitlements, passwords, and third-party network access.
Audit existing implementations and identify security risks, operational and reliability risks, SLA risks, and excessive energy or maintenance costs.
Support annual controls operating and capital expenditure budgeting, critical remediation capital expenditures, maintenance contracts, end-of-life equipment replacement, and upgrades supporting corporate goals.
Develop, document, and publish corporate controls design and operations standards, including architecture, hardware, vendors, operator interfaces, naming schemes, SOOs, monitoring, and alerting.
Lead third-party implementations for new construction, upgrades, additions, and special projects, including scope definition, contractor vetting and selection, pricing review, onboarding, progress meetings, submittal and RFI review, change-order review, and implementation QA/QC.
Lead the commissioning life cycle for data center BAS, BMS, and electromechanical systems, validating systems that control and monitor HVAC and electrical infrastructure.
Review commissioning scripts, monitor execution, review reports and issues, lead owner punch lists and follow-up, and vet closeout and transition to operations.
Lead internal support and customer integrations, working with Facility Operations teams to enable local control within the I&C sandbox and support reliability, reporting, efficiency, and operations initiatives; manage related training and documentation.
Implement and support customer integrations as directed by Customer Operations.
Review quarterly BMS and electrical systems maintenance results and action items, and take steps to resolve issues.
Operate and maintain controls hardware and software, including break-fix work, preventive maintenance, tuning, and adjustments.
Oversee testing and tuning of mechanical plant controls, including chillers, cooling towers, and air-handling units, maintaining data visibility and system redundancy through SCADA implementations.
Participate in the on-call schedule as a secondary escalation for immediate BMS and electrical systems technical support at in-service data centers.
Troubleshoot BAS, BMS, and EPMS issues and conduct root cause analysis or corrective action.
Provide site-level and global plant performance reporting.
Develop and maintain a maintenance program for controls equipment, including hardware preventive maintenance such as sensor calibration and valve stroking, and platform maintenance such as patches and backups.
Specify IT and network resources required by controls applications.
Configure and manage EPMS, BAS, and BMS alarm frameworks; optimize alarm logic, prioritization, and thresholds to reduce false alarms, improve signal-to-noise ratio, and enable rapid, accurate responses to critical infrastructure events.
Complete special projects assigned by the manager.

Benefits

PPO and HDHP healthcare plans.
Flexible spending account (FSA) and health savings account (HSA), with an above-market employer HSA match.
Dental and vision insurance.
Employer-paid disability and life insurance.
Additional group insurance plans.
Paid vacation, sick, and personal leave.
Ten company-paid holidays.
Paid parental leave.
401(k) with up to 4% employer match.
Personal development and learning opportunities.
Employee referral program.