BESS Fire Safety Engineer

Job Description:

This position centers on fire safety expertise for utility-scale Battery Energy Storage Systems (BESS). It involves technical analysis, design reviews, compliance checks, stakeholder education, and standards development—all to ensure fire risk is minimized and emergency response plans are solid.

Job Description:

• Act as a Fire Safety subject matter expert (SME) for utility-scale battery energy storage systems (BESS).

• Review all UL 9540a reports from cell-, module-, and up through unit/installation-level, and provide direction.

• Analyze, approve, and offer guidance toward the fire safety system designs of BESS manufacturers and projects.

• Review, provide feedback, and offer guidance for all project- and product-level designs regarding BESS safety and code compliance, ensuring adherence to all applicable codes and standards, including UL, NFPA, and IFC.

• Oversee all safety analyses for project-level reports, including hazard mitigation analysis (HMA), failure mode and effects analysis (FMEA), heat flux analysis, and computational fluid dynamics (CFD) simulations ensuring that all fire safety requirements are met or exceeded.

• Initiate and foster relationships with national, state, and local fire institutions and first responders, including Fire Marshalls, Fire Departments, and educational institutions.

• Travel to local jurisdictions to present BESS and fire safety to first responders, authorities having jurisdiction (AHJs), public utility commissions (PUCs), and community meetings, addressing and educating about the concerns of each stakeholder.

• Work closely with local firefighters and first responders to educate them about the potential BESS hazards, hazard mitigation, fire safety system designs, sequences of operation, and emergency response/operation plans (ERP/EOPs).

• Standardize information around BESS fire safety systems throughout the organization, ensuring consistent messaging in every region in which our projects are deployed.

• Participate in task groups and technical committees for collaboration and direction of the advancement of industry codes and standards pertaining to the safety of battery energy storage systems.

• Templatize and create standard outlines for third party analysis and reporting to allow for consistency across the board with various suppliers and improve the effectiveness and efficiency of onboarding a new supplier.

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