Senior Techno-economic Analyst

Job Description

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 nearly $3 billion in capital, making us the largest and leading private fusion company in the world.

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.

Join the power movement as a Senior Techno-economic Analyst

For fusion power plants to be successful they must be economically competitive with other power generation technologies. The techno-economic analyst is responsible for developing models critical to evaluating fusion power plants' financial viability and commercial desirability. The candidate will work closely with internal CFS team members to create and evolve economic models, run sensitivity analysis, identify opportunities for improvement and provide input to design, engineering, and R&D on impacts. This role will serve an important function within the business development team supporting communicating the benefits of fusion energy to customers and key stakeholders.

What you'll do

• Deliver:
  • Continue the development of techno-economic modeling at CFS to characterize the future costs and benefits of ARC, the world's first commercial fusion power plant
  • Incorporate expectations for learning and experience benefits as the company develops additional power plants
  • Establish and maintain company best practices and lessons learned related to analytical methods and models. Systematically work to improve models and analysis over time
  • Develop and assess ARC pricing and go to market approaches, including alternative applications of ARC beyond electricity
  • Track and maintain current assessment of ARC competitiveness compared to other energy solutions
  • Model the economic impact of ARC power plants for communities, regions, and states
  • Support individual project level analysis, including regional and local specifics, financing structures, and incentives
  • Expand economic modeling to target foreign markets to help inform go-to-market strategies
  • Work closely with the Scientific Software team to maintain the modeling tools and their underlying assumptions over time
  • Collaborate closely with Research and Development (R&D), Engineering, Manufacturing, Scientific Software, System Engineers, Finance, Business Development, and external stakeholders to collect primary data, populate techno-economic models, productionalize the model, and validate model fidelity
  • Provide support for non-power plant business functions and other duties as assigned
  • Prepare briefing materials, write and publish research results in internal technical reports and public facing presentations, including collaborations with key external partners
  • Support Investor Relations, Business Development, Corporate Finance, and Engineering teams as needed, and on-demand with queries and reports
• Strategize:
  • Work closely with procurement to refine estimates for costs for the power plant and associated systems
  • Identify key areas of risk, uncertainty, and variability within models and develop mitigation strategies with the business to alleviate where possible
  • Serve as a feedback loop to the R&D and engineering organizations to understand the key levers to continuously drive down ARC costs and LCOE
  • Synthesize quantitative results to provide insight into potential future technology research and development opportunities and design decisions
• Problem Solve:
  • Apply quantitative and qualitative research, case studies, literature reviews, and learnings from internal and external subject matter experts to identify key variables and sensitivities important to determining the costs and value of ARC
  • Model the first-of-a-kind and future generations of fusion power plants under a wide range of development and deployment scenarios
  • Support the evaluation of new R&D opportunities, Open Innovation pathways, technology advancement, and market opportunities
  • Respectfully raise concerns, providing a sound rationale or data to support perspectives
  • Support potential customers, sponsors, partners, and investors in diligence processes
  • Support management in developing scope, budget, and schedule for new projects based on matching expertise and capabilities to research needs and project opportunities

What we're looking for

• Bachelor's Degree in Engineering, Engineering Technologies, Business, Finance, Economics, Math, Physics or a related field
• Exposure to or professional knowledge of energy systems
• Experience working on quantitative analysis with probabilistic models
• Experience working in cross-functional teams and facilitating collaboration across domains
• Experience managing stakeholder relationships, including prioritizing and executing disparate sets of deliverables on tight timelines with clear communication
• MS Excel - Mastery
• MS Power Point - Proficiency
• Probabilistic modeling and forecasting
• Ability to work collaboratively in a team environment as well as autonomously to close gaps.
• Capable of executing on mid to long-term assignments that are loosely defined
• Understand the calculation, derivation, and drivers of variability of key industry metrics including, but not limited to, levelized cost of energy, overnight capital costs, internal rate of return, and utility return on equity
• Professional knowledge and understanding of thermodynamics and engineering fundamentals, with ability to solve analytical problems related to energy usage and plant optimization from first principles
• Generates work plans, defines milestones for own tasks, and helps define processes that impact direct work. Contributes to process improvement
• Strong organizational abilities to manage many various cases and scenarios
• Ability to map out and understand complex interconnected systems
• Exquisite attention to detail applied across a multitude of systems, ensuring comprehensive analysis and identification of gaps in quality or detail
• Reliable and persistent work ethic, seeing tasks through to completion. Stays determined in the face of uncertainty and setbacks
• Ability to identify the right level of detail for a given task and flexibility to adapt to modeling both rough, quick estimates for establishing development priorities and detailed, reliable models for finalizing project specifications
• Adaptability to a start-up environment, capability to take initiative, develop own tasks and timelines, and solve broad, ambiguous problems
• Operates with general guidance from management and increasingly takes

Bonus points for

• 5-10 years of relevant industry experience
• Experience with detailed process modeling of emerging technologies and techno-economic models of new technologies and systems
• Cross-functional experience in energy system engineering, business development, and financial modeling
• Experience developing probabilistic models with a focus on energy system modeling and optimization
• Comfort with mathematical modeling and tool development in python

Must-have requirements

• Perform activities such as typing, standing, and sitting, for extended periods of time
• Willingness to occasionally travel or work required nights/weekends/on-call
• 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

$110,000 - $185,000 a year

Salary range for this full-time position + equity + benefits. The actual salary will depend on level, location, qualifications, and experience. The range displayed on each job posting reflects new hire salaries for the position across all US locations. Benefits include:

• * Competitive compensation with equity
• * 12.5 Company-wide Holidays
• * Flexible vacation days
• * 10 sick days
• * Generous parental leave policy
• * Health, dental, and vision insurance
• * 401(k) with employer matching
• * Professional growth opportunities
• * Team-building activities

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.

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.