Principal Data Engineer

Overview

We are designing the grid of the future! 

Be a part of an innovative team shaping the grid of the future through advanced energy intelligence.  For more than half a century, Electric Power Engineers, (EPE) has partnered with power and energy clients across the globe providing consulting expertise and energy intelligence software solutions for complex engineering and grid modeling challenges. As leaders in the renewables space, we are focused on building a modern, secure, and resilient gid.   Join us in making an impact on the communities we serve and the environment in which we live. Together we can transform the future of energy.

Responsibilities

Join us in leading the change!

EPE is seeking a Principal Data Engineer to lead the design, development, and implementation of scalable data infrastructure supporting EPE’s consulting services and software offerings (ENER-i™ and InSights). This role will focus on building high-performance data pipelines, AI/ML-ready architectures, and robust data governance frameworks to support real-time grid analytics, predictive modeling, and enterprise-wide reporting. The successful candidate will be responsible for architecting scalable, cloud-native data solutions, ensuring efficient data integration across EPE’s systems, and optimizing performance for large-scale energy datasets. 

Principal Duties and Responsibilities: 

• Design and develop scalable data pipelines (ETL/ELT) for ingestion, processing, and storage across cloud environments. 
• Architect and implement unified data platforms supporting AI/ML, predictive analytics, and energy forecasting. 
• Develop a real-time data streaming framework for integrating energy grid datasets, IoT sensors (SCADA, AMI), and enterprise applications. 
• Establish a high-performance data infrastructure leveraging cloud-native solutions (AWS, Azure, Google Cloud). 
• Optimize data storage and retrieval for large-scale time-series datasets and geospatial data (GIS). 
• Develop and implement efficient centralized data delivery methods and services to meet the consulting requirements of EPE consulting groups and software solutions. 

AI/ML-Ready Data Pipelines & Automation: 

• Ensure data pipelines are AI/ML-ready, supporting training, validation, and deployment of predictive models. 
• Develop automated data preprocessing frameworks for feature engineering, anomaly detection, and energy forecasting. 
• Work closely with data scientists and machine learning engineers to integrate AI-driven insights into production systems. 
• Implement MLOps best practices for scalable and repeatable machine learning deployments. 

Enterprise Data Integration & Reporting: 

• Build enterprise-wide data integration solutions, connecting Finance, HR, Sales, and Operations systems (e.g., Salesforce, ERP, FinOps, Accounting, Billing). 
• Develop real-time reporting and business intelligence dashboards to enhance decision-making. 
• Eliminate data silos by implementing standardized data governance policies and metadata management. 

Performance Optimization & Reliability Engineering: 

• Optimize query performance, data retrieval speeds, and processing efficiency for energy grid analytics. 
• Implement data validation, monitoring, and anomaly detection to improve data integrity and reliability. 
• Ensure scalability, fault tolerance, and disaster recovery for mission-critical data systems. 

Security, Compliance & Data Governance: 

• Define and enforce data governance frameworks, ensuring compliance with FERC, NERC, ISO/RTO regulations. 
• Implement data privacy, encryption, and access control mechanisms for sensitive energy and customer data. 
• Establish audit trails, lineage tracking, and data quality monitoring to ensure regulatory compliance. 

Technical Leadership & Mentorship: 

• Lead and mentor a team of Data Engineers, Data Scientists, Machine Learning Engineers, and Data Analysts. 
• Stay updated on emerging data engineering, cloud computing, and AI/ML trends, incorporating innovative solutions. 
• Conduct code reviews, enforce best practices, and drive technical excellence across the data engineering team. 

Qualifications

Bring your passion, here's what’s needed:

• Bachelor’s or Master’s degree in Computer Science, Software Engineering, or a related field
• 7+ years working with large-scale data pipelines, cloud architectures, and AI/ML-driven data solutions.
• Expertise in SQL, NoSQL, PostgreSQL, MySQL, MongoDB.
• Strong programming skills in Python, Java, Scala, with experience in data wrangling and ETL automation.
• Experience with big data processing frameworks (Apache Spark, Airflow, Talend).
• Deep expertise in cloud data solutions (Snowflake, AWS Athena, AWS Redshift, Azure Synapse, Google BigQuery).
• Experience with data workflow orchestration pipelines (Dagster, DTB, AirByte, etc...)
• Experience with Kafka, Flink, or other data streaming platforms for real-time analytics.
• Strong API development and microservices integration expertise.
• Familiarity with Infrastructure as Code (Terraform, Kubernetes) for scalable deployments.
• Experience in business intelligence tools (Power BI, Tableau, Looker). 

Preferred Education and Experience: 

• Experience in the power and energy industry, working with SCADA, AMI, EMS, and grid modeling datasets. 
• Expertise in AI/ML-driven energy forecasting, anomaly detection, and optimization models. 
• Knowledge of geospatial data (GIS) for grid planning and renewable energy analytics. 
• Experience with data governance frameworks, compliance (FERC, NERC), and regulatory reporting. 

How we support you:

• Comprehensive health and wellness benefits including medical, dental, and vision with 100% premium coverage for you.
• Generous PTO and paid holidays
• Work with industry leaders
• 401K, up to a 4% match (100% vested from day 1)
• Flexible Work including hybrid and remote possibilities based on position.

Location: Austin, TX - Remote

Travel:  Occasional travel may be needed (10% or less)

EPE is an equal opportunity/AA/Disability/Veteran employer. The EEO is the Law poster, and its supplement are available using the following links: EEOC is the Law Poster

If you are interested in applying for employment with EPE and need special assistance to apply for a posted position, please send an email to: applicationassistance@epeconsulting.com

Third-Party Recruiting Notification

EPE does not accept unsolicited resumes from third-party recruiters. Any unsolicited third-party resumes forwarded by recruiters to EPE via our career page or to any of our managers or employees will be considered public information, may be treated as a direct application from the person identified in the resume, and will not be eligible for placement fee payment to the agency. EPE will not pay a fee to a third-party recruiter or agency without a previously signed third-party agreement and has not coordinated their recruiting activity with the appropriate member of the Talent Acquisition team.