MLOps Engineer

Grassroots Carbon • San Antonio, TX

15h

About The Position

Grassroots Carbon is seeking a hands-on AI/ML Ops Engineer to build and maintain the data infrastructure powering our carbon measurement, rancher tools, and emerging AI-native applications. You'll work at the intersection of our Data Science and Product teams, translating experimental models into production systems while building the connectors that enable real-time data flows across our platform. This role is critical to our 2026 goals: delivering AI-native ranch management tools, scaling our MRV (Measurement, Reporting, Verification) capabilities, and enabling third-party hardware integrations that put actionable intelligence directly into ranchers' hands. We're looking for someone who thrives on building reliable infrastructure, has strong opinions about data quality, and can work autonomously in a fast-moving environment where the roadmap is ambitious and the problems are genuinely novel. This role is roughly 50% data pipeline work, 30% model deployment/monitoring, 20% integrations

Requirements

• 3-5+ years of experience in data engineering, ML engineering, or MLOps roles
• Strong Python skills with production experience in data processing frameworks (Airflow, Prefect, or similar orchestration tools)
• Experience deploying and monitoring ML models in production (MLflow, SageMaker, Vertex AI, or similar)
• Hands-on experience with cloud infrastructure (AWS or GCP preferred: Lambda, S3, EC2, Step Functions, RDS or their GCP equivalent)
• Working knowledge of SQL and experience with both relational and time-series data
• Experience building and consuming REST APIs
• Familiarity with geospatial data processing
• Ability to work autonomously and make sound technical decisions with limited guidance
• Strong debugging skills and a methodical approach to troubleshooting production issues
• Clear communication with both technical and non-technical stakeholders
• Comfort with ambiguity and rapidly evolving requirements
• Genuine interest in climate, agriculture, and/or environmental technology

Nice To Haves

• Experience with satellite imagery, remote sensing, or environmental data

Responsibilities

• Design, build, and maintain scalable ETL pipelines for soil carbon data, satellite imagery, weather data, and ranch management inputs
• Productionize data science team outputs, transforming research models (process-based and machine learning) into reliable, monitored production systems
• Build and maintain data validation, monitoring, and alerting systems that catch issues before they impact downstream users
• Own data quality and lineage across the platform, ensuring our carbon calculations maintain the scientific rigor our protocols require
• Deploy and monitor ML models for soil carbon stock change prediction, biomass estimation, and ranch management photo verification systems
• Build inference pipelines that serve predictions to both internal dashboards and customer-facing applications
• Implement model versioning, A/B testing infrastructure, and rollback capabilities
• Optimize model performance for cost efficiency at scale (we're running models across millions of acres)
• Build real-time data connectors for third-party hardware integrations (GPS tracking, virtual fencing, scale systems, weather stations)
• Develop APIs that expose ML predictions and aggregated data to internal teams and external partners
• Work with engineering to integrate data capabilities into PastureMap's mobile and web applications
• Support protocol compliance by ensuring data pipelines meet CAR, Verra, and emerging standard requirements
• Partner with Data Science to understand model requirements and translate research code into production-ready systems
• Work with Product to scope data requirements for new features and ensure technical feasibility
• Document systems thoroughly and establish operational runbooks
• Contribute to architectural decisions

Benefits

• Competitive base salary, performance-based bonus, equity participation, health/dental/vision insurance, flexible PTO, 401(k), and support for professional development
• Health Insurance, with plans as low as $0 deductible and $0 co-pay
• Dental and vision insurance plans
• Flexible spending account option
• Open Paid Time Off Policy plus 9 paid holidays per year
• Participation in our 401(k) savings plan
• Company-paid Life and AD&D coverage
• Educational materials and expenses to support continuing education opportunities

What This Job Offers

• Job Type: Full-time
• Career Level: Mid Level
• Education Level: No Education Listed