Senior Nuclear Engineer - Formulation

Blue Origin • Southgate, WA

1d • $133,500 - $203,263

About The Position

At Blue Origin, we envision millions of people living and working in space for the benefit of Earth. We’re working to develop reusable, safe, and low-cost space vehicles and systems within a culture of safety, collaboration, and inclusion. Join our team of problem solvers as we add new chapters to the history of spaceflight! This role is part of Advanced Concepts and Enterprise Engineering (ACE), supporting Blue Origin’s mission of millions of people living and working in space for the benefit of Earth. The team fosters innovation and drives engineering workflows of the future, shared solutions and standards, simplicity and lower costs, and manufacturable design. This position is part of the Space Systems Development (SSD) business unit. SSD develops next-generation concepts and systems to advance our future of living and working in space sustainably. As part of a passionate, and hardworking team of engineers, you will help define the nuclear portfolio of propulsion and power systems for in space and lunar applications. You will help guide multi-disciplinary teams to align the engine and power system architecture with customer and company strategies, products, and technology maturation plans. If you are adept at managing to a plan, comfortable responding to evolving requirements or external constraints, and prioritizing efforts all the while infusing and facilitating creativity and innovation, you will share in the team’s impact on all aspects of vehicle development and verification.

Requirements

• Passion for Blue Origin’s mission: Millions of people living and working space for the benefit of earth!
• Minimum of a B.S. degree in nuclear engineering or equivalent technical field
• 5+ years proven experience in the design, development, and/or transient analysis of reactor systems (level commensurate on experience)
• 2+ years of experience overseeing, guiding, and mentoring less experienced engineers
• Knowledgeable of reactor modeling and simulation
• Knowledgeable of space nuclear systems
• Working knowledge of thermodynamics, fluid dynamics, and heat transfer
• Ability to lead and work effectively in teams
• Ability to be self-directed and balance several tasks at one time
• Ability to communicate analysis results effectivity

Nice To Haves

• M.S. or Ph.D. in engineering discipline
• Knowledge of nuclear thermal propulsion systems and in-space nuclear electrical power generation systems
• Knowledge of reactor system development and test
• Knowledge of how to create generalized point kinetic model of reactor designs, Monte Carlo methods for nuclear analysis, nodal diffusion codes and/or other reactor analysis codes.
• Reactor design, optimization, design automation, data visualization, coupled fluid flow, heat conduction, solid mechanics, neutronics and system behaviors for propulsion and power system solutions.
• Proficient with modeling tools and scripting languages such as MATLAB/Simulink, ROCETS, Amesim, or similar
• Experience with proposal support (technical/management volumes, Task Description/Basis-of-Estimate development, etc.)
• Experience working with U.S. Government research agencies (e.g. NASA, AFRL, DARPA, DOE, INL)
• Experience with fault-tolerance strategies and architectures for safety and mission-critical systems
• Experience developing requirements, defining subsystem interfaces (both in-house and between external partners/suppliers), and other systems engineering products and practices
• Experience across the product life cycle (pre-conceptual design through field support)

Responsibilities

• Working with emerging and existing advanced concept program organizations to distill high level requirements into power and rocket propulsion system derived requirements
• Trading engine and power nuclear reactor systems and components, working fluid choices, system configurations, power generation, and overall reactor components for the best overall, optimized solution with assessments of mass properties and historically based cost estimates
• Working closely with systems and component design engineers to rapidly assess conceptual designs, perform system trade studies, develop integrated design solutions, formulate system margin strategy and performance parameters
• Assessing needs to onramp lower TRL technologies, and the respective cost and risk benefits
• Maturing and publishing the system-level reactor architecture, such as material and thermodynamic states, operational modes, functional flow block diagrams, and data flows
• Developing and maturing Level 1 reactor engine and power system requirements and verification methodologies as well as risk assessments, collaborating with the Systems Engineering organization
• Work with reactor, engine and component test groups to develop test and risk reduction plans
• Perform mission analysis with a reactor propulsion and power generation focus, flying the vehicle/stage/spacecraft across the mission concept of operations to optimize engine and power design characteristics, and determine failure modes
• Coach, mentor and technically assist other engineers
• Represent the program and company in technical discussions with external customers

Benefits

• Medical, dental, vision, basic and supplemental life insurance, paid parental leave, short and long-term disability, 401(k) with a company match of up to 5%, and an Education Support Program.
• Up to four (4) weeks per year based on weekly scheduled hours, and up to 14 company-paid holidays.
• Dependent on role type and job level, employees may be eligible for benefits and bonuses based on the company's intent to reward individual contributions and enable them to share in the company's results, or other factors at the company's sole discretion.

What This Job Offers

• Job Type: Full-time
• Career Level: Mid Level