Head of Heating, Diagnostics and Balance-Of-Plant department

Renaissance Fusion is the first Magnetic Confinement Fusion company in the EU. We are building the first net-energy producing stellarator by combining proprietary innovations in modular design, the manufacturing of next-generation High-Temperature Superconducting (HTS) magnets, and liquid-metal (LM) walls. We are forming a team of the brightest, most driven scientists and engineers to realize and commercialize our non-fusion products within 2 years and integrated fusion solutions within 10 years.

Five technical leaders will be at the forefront of this exhilarating development and prototyping. With the present announcement we look for one of them, an experienced, world-class engineer and manager to form, inspire and lead the department of Heating, Diagnostics and Balance-Of-Plant (HDB) Engineering.

The successful candidate will report directly to the CTO and work closely with the other Heads. He/she will deliver integrated systems consisting of the plasma heating systems, radiation protection, instrumentation and control equipment for the stellarator diagnostics, nuclear safety, and the power conversion systems. These systems should be compatible with liquid metal operations at high temperature, HTS magnets, and in fine, with fusion plasma operation through a toroidal geometry.

In other words, you play a major role in first plasmas, seamless operation of a net-heat stellarator experiments, and finally a net-electricity power-plant.

Your main responsibilities will be:

*Scientific leadership and activities

• Lead, coordinate and integrate all HDB activities
• Monitor, coordinate and enable the on-time, on-budget, on-specs accomplishment of technical milestones. Experimental milestones will include the commissioning of heating, diagnostics, the blanket, balance-of-plant systems such as power-conversion and fuel-cycle systems. Other milestones will include neutron irradiation tests of materials and validation of compliance with nuclear safety regulations. This work will be carried out on the experimental reactors as well as power-plants.
• Conduct conceptual and detailed design reviews of integrated systems consisting of plasma diagnostics, reactor sensors and control, power conversion systems and plasma heating equipment (such as Electron Cyclotron Resonant Heating (ECRH), Current Drive (ECCD), and Neutral Beam Injection (NBI)). Integration is carried out within the experimental reactor and, ultimately, power-plant.
• Design and lead experiments to de-risk HDB systems and test them to their limits.

*Team management 

• Form and lead the HDB department (group leaders, engineers and technicians).
• Be the ambassador of Renaissance Fusion's vision within your team, and promote its culture, values (speed, simplicity, fantastic realism, constructive interference and unified force) and policies
• Encourage collaboration at all levels of the organization
• Ensure that your team is motivated to achieve its objectives: set targets and follow them up with encouragement, support, feedback and responsibility
• Ensure that employees are in the best position to achieve their objectives: listen to them, look after their well-being, make sure they have the appropriate tools and skills; fill the gap if necessary (recruitment, training, reorganization…)
• Take an active role in talent development: identify potential, determine areas and opportunities for development, encourage reflection on professional projects, propose training courses
• Appoint, empower, inspire and coordinate the group-leaders. Train the group-leaders of tomorrow
• Comply with and enforce the highest Health, Environment and Safety standards within her/his team. Ensure that the laboratory is a safe, clean, well-organized, pleasant workplace by controlling many hazards (magnetic fields, high electric currents, very high and low temperatures, gases and high-pressure liquids, etc.)

*Scientific input to company strategy 

• In your field of expertise:

-Identify scientific needs, directions, priorities and goals in the short, medium and long term, to realize the company’s mission and vision of building and commercializing a stellarator power-plant and non-fusion spin-offs

-Identify scientific risks and opportunities and spearheads the team efforts to address them

• As a scientific leader, contribute to the global scientific thinking, mission-driven brainstorm discussions to contribute to the collective intelligence and capacity of Renaissance Fusion to remain at the forefront of innovation

*Scientific outcome 

• Organize the department’s attendance of scientific conferences and workshops, supervise scientific reports (presentations, posters, etc.) and represent Renaissance Fusion to scientific conferences and workshops
• Coordinate the writing, review and approval of patents and scientific papers
• Supervise your team to stay at the state of the art for any scientific advances in your scope of expertise
• Initiate and develop collaborations and partnerships with labs and partners such as super-computing facilities, external services etc. Maximize co-creation of value

You are the ideal profile if: 

*Education and professional experience 

• PhD or Master’s degree + equivalent experience in electrical, industrial, mechanical or nuclear engineering, or closely related field.
• Management certification or equivalent experience of Team Management
• 15+ years of in international labs or in the industry- in design, modeling, manufacturing, and testing in at least 3 of the following areas:

-Plasma heating technology

-Fusion plasma diagnostics

-Power conversion systems

-Neutronics, radioprotection, nuclear safety

Tritium fuel cycle

• Experience in designing, purchasing, testing or using of one or more of these activities is a plus:

-Diagnostics equipment for plasma monitoring and control

-Irradiation experiments

-Radioactive materials and related instrumentation

-Tritium and isotope separation systems

-Large turbines and generators

-Large scale heat exchangers

-Working fluids for heat extraction (water, supercritical CO2, liquid metals, etc.) and refrigeration (liquid N2, He gas, liquid He, etc.)

• Experience or familiarity with one or more of the following fields is a plus : nuclear safety, energy, electricity, big science, particle accelerators, medical, metallurgy, innovative materials.

*Language requirements 

• Fluent in English (C2)
• Knowledge (B2 or higher) of French is a plus

*Technical competencies 

• Safety standards
• Risks management in complex projects
• Contract management
• Modern CAD and simulation tools (multi-physics FEA, Monte Carlo, topology optimization etc.)
• Detailed knowledge of nuclear and plasma physics, nuclear safety and regulation is a plus
• Detailed knowledge of nuclear civil engineering, remote handling and waste management is a plus

At Renaissance Fusion, we value diversity and are an equal opportunity employer. We consider all qualified applicants equally for employment. We do not discriminate on the basis of origin; gender; morals, sexual orientation; sexual identity; age; marital status; pregnancy; genetic characteristics; actual or assumed membership or non-membership of an ethnic group, nation or race; political opinions; trade union or mutualist activities; religious beliefs; physical appearance; family name; place of residence; state of health; disability.