Principal Chemical Engineer

Commonwealth Fusion Systems • Full-time • Devens, Massachusetts, United States • $120k - $180k / year • 2m ago

About Commonwealth Fusion Systems:

Commonwealth Fusion Systems is on a mission to deliver the urgent transition to fusion energy.

Combining decades of research, top talent and new technologies, we're designing and building commercially viable fusion power plants. And working with policymakers and suppliers to build the energy industry of the future.

We're in the best position to make it happen. Since 2018, we've raised over $2 billion in capital - more than any other fusion energy company in the U.S.

Now we're looking for more thinkers, doers, builders, and makers to join us. People who'll bring new perspectives, solve tough problems, and thrive as part of a team.

If that's you and this role fits, we want to hear from you.

Commonwealth Fusion Systems (CFS) has the fastest, lowest cost path to commercial fusion energy.

CFS is collaborating with MIT to leverage decades of research combined with new groundbreaking high-temperature superconducting (HTS) magnet technology. HTS magnets will enable compact fusion power plants that can be constructed faster and at lower cost. The mission is to deploy fusion power plants to meet global decarbonization goals as fast as possible. CFS has assembled a team of leaders in tough tech, fusion science, and manufacturing with a track record of rapid execution. Supported by the world's leading investors, CFS is uniquely positioned to deliver limitless, clean, fusion power to combat climate change. To execute this plan, we are looking to add talented people to the team who are mission-driven and treat people well, improve our team by adding diverse perspectives and new ways of solving problems, have demonstrated exceptional results through a range of different pursuits, and have skill sets and experience that relate to this role.

ARC will be the first machine to produce electricity from fusion energy, serving as the cornerstone to a new industry. ARC will strongly leverage the work that's been done for SPARC in developing HTS magnets and other key tokamak systems. However, because of its mission to deliver power to the grid, the ARC tokamak has a few systems not included on SPARC, such as the Blanket System, which uses FLiBe to breed tritium and capture heat. The Blanket System group within R&D is a growing team that is delivering key scientific and engineering results to push the technical readiness level of these new enabling technologies higher.

The Blanket System team at CFS is looking to grow the team as we expand our operations into larger-scale, FLiBe-based test loops. As the Blanket System team develops and builds larger systems, maintaining strong controls on our salt and its chemistry becomes increasingly important. The Blanket System team is looking for a Principal Chemical Engineer to lead the development of chemistry control and salt purification systems. This engineer will need to work collaboratively with internal teams at CFS as well as with key external partners to reach ARC's ambitious technical targets.

The Blanket System team has a strong practice of carrying engineering risk where appropriate while attentively and aggressively managing safety risk, and is looking for an engineer who will actively contribute to this culture.

This role requires compliance with U.S. laws concerning the export of controlled or protected technologies or information (collectively, "Export Control Laws"). Any offer of employment will be contingent on the need for compliance with such Export Control Laws.

This team member will:

- Design, Build, and test chemistry control technologies for molten salt, specifically as related to hydrogen behavior and redox control
- Scale-up benchtop-level processes to power-plant-relevant quantities of salt
- Own technology selection and development for key chemical processes relevant to the salt blanket including around: salt production, salt purification, enrichment, online chemistry control, and tritium extraction
- Identify, communicate, and manage risks around large-scale salt chemical processing. Develop hardware testing strategies to quantify and mitigate key risks
- Act as technical expert to provide input on salt processing both internally and externally
- Work closely with other CFS teams including:
- - Supply Chain team to manage development of external supply chains of molten salts
- - Safety team to manage chemical hazards (including beryllium) in existing and new experimental test articles
- - ARC Design Team

The ideal candidate will have most, if not all, of these requirements:

- BS in Chemical, Mechanical, or Nuclear Engineering or a related field
- 7+ years of experience in the engineering of integrated thermofluid and chemical processing systems, from conceptual design through commissioning
- Experience with R&D hardware development
- Experience with scale-up of novel chemical processes
- Experience traveling to manage vendors at their sites, willing to travel occasionally
- Ability to work effectively in a multidisciplinary team of engineers, scientists, technical staff and others
- Ability to clearly express and critique ideas
- Great communication and organizational skills
- Strong problem solving skills, ability to approach new problems with creativity

Additional preferred experience and/or qualifications:

- MS or PhD in Chemical, Mechanical, or Nuclear Engineering or a related field
- Experience with high temperature systems and/or molten salt systems, especially molten fluorides.
- Experience with corrosive or other extreme environment processes
- Experience with Front-End-Loading (FEL) engineering design cycle, or equivalent
- Work in a facility that contains industrial hazards including heat, cold, noise, fumes, strong magnets, lead (Pb), high voltage, high current, pressure systems, and cryogenics
- Willingness to travel or work required nights/weekends/on-call occasionally
- #LI-Onsite

At CFS, we excel in fast-paced environments, driven by our values of integrity, execution, impact, and self-critique. As we grow, we're eager to bring on mission-driven folks who offer diverse perspectives and fresh ways to tackle challenges.

We value diversity deeply and are proud to be an equal opportunity employer by choice. We consider all qualified applicants equally, regardless of race, color, national origin, ancestry, citizenship status, protected veteran status, religion, physical or mental disability, marital status, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, age, or any other basis protected by law.

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