Senior Controls Engineer

Voltify•Jacksonville, FL

18h•$140,000 - $180,000•Hybrid

About The Position

Voltify is developing the next generation of rail transportation with battery locomotives that fast charge autonomously and dynamically through a dedicated self-sustained microgrid network. This innovation aims to reduce rail energy costs by over 20% annually in North America. The company has secured significant orders and funding, with a founding team experienced in building successful billion-dollar companies in renewable energy and infrastructure. The Senior Controls Engineer will lead the development and operation of complex microgrid control systems integrated with the company's Electric Locomotive charging infrastructure. This role involves owning the entire control stack, from field-level device integration and SCADA development to cloud-connected analytics and optimization. The engineer will design and implement sophisticated control logic using Ignition by Inductive Automation, integrating various energy assets like solar, BESS, grid interconnects, and chargers into a unified control plane. Responsibilities also include software engineering for cloud backends, data pipelines, and internal tools to support the real-time energy management platform. The systems developed will directly command physical hardware to optimize energy flows for advanced rail transportation. This is a high-impact position requiring expertise in control systems and modern software engineering, emphasizing extreme ownership and speed.

Requirements

5+ years of hands-on experience with Ignition by Inductive Automation — including project design, scripting (Python/Jython), tag configuration, alarming, transaction groups, and gateway network architecture.
Expertise in microgrid control systems — understanding of power flows, protection schemes, islanding/reconnection logic, and the coordination of DERs (solar, BESS, gensets, loads).
Strong proficiency in Python — ability to build standalone services, data processing pipelines, and automation tools.
Proven track record integrating software with physical hardware.
Fluency in industrial communication protocols: Modbus TCP, OPC-UA, DNP3, or CANbus.
Strong research and learning capabilities with excellent critical thinking and problem-solving skills.
Experience in defining MVPs, conducting code reviews, mentoring junior engineers, and making architectural decisions that balance speed with reliability.
Experience or strong willingness to work with AWS services (DynamoDB, Lambda, IoT Core) for cloud-connected control applications.

Nice To Haves

Experience with JavaScript/TypeScript for frontend/dashboard tasks.

Responsibilities

Design, develop, and maintain microgrid SCADA/HMI systems in Ignition (JPython scripting, alarming, reporting, tag architecture, and gateway administration).
Architect and implement control logic for complex microgrid systems — managing solar inverters, battery energy storage systems (BESS), grid-tie interconnections, and EV/locomotive chargers.
Integrate diverse industrial hardware using protocols such as Modbus TCP/RTU, OPC-UA, DNP3, and CANbus.
Implement the bi-directional communication pipeline (Cloud ↔ Edge) via MQTT, ensuring data integrity and handling connectivity edge cases.
Develop Python-based backend services, converting optimization model outputs into actionable commands for field devices.
Build internal management dashboards to monitor system health, energy flows, and operational metrics.
Support cloud infrastructure and data pipelines on AWS (DynamoDB, Lambda, IoT Core) to complement edge control systems.
Travel occasionally for on-site commissioning, integration testing, and troubleshooting at deployment locations.