Senior Data Scientist – AI Grid Modeling

Sunairio, Inc.; Baltimore (MD); On-site; USD 150,000 - 190,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Equity compensation

Collaborative team environment

Competitive salary

Flexibility in vacation policy

Health insurance plan

401(k) with company match

Job summary

An innovative energy tech firm in Baltimore is seeking a Technical Leader to build market models and integrate AI/LLMs for energy forecasting. This role demands a blend of quantitative finance and machine learning skills, as well as the ability to tackle the complexities of the evolving energy market. The ideal candidate will thrive on challenges and be driven by impact. Competitive compensation, equity options, and a collaborative environment await the right individual, with additional perks like health insurance and flexible vacations.

Qualifications

• Experience building end-to-end modeling systems in real-world scenarios.
• Deep expertise in modern machine learning techniques applied to complex datasets.
• Proficiency in leveraging machine learning for code acceleration and data extraction.

Responsibilities

• Design and deploy probabilistic models for energy market fundamentals.
• Integrate AI/LLMs to automate data processing and enhance model accuracy.
• Collaborate with teams to translate atmospheric signals into market outcomes.

Skills

Quantitative finance expertise

Energy economics knowledge

Machine learning

Data analysis

Commercial intuition

Technical proficiency in Python

Understanding of ISO/RTO markets

Tools

Python (NumPy, Pandas, Xarray)

Large Language Models

Job description

Builder Mindset | Techno-economic Forecasting

About Sunairio

Sunairio uses AI, probabilistic modeling, and high-resolution climate data to forecast energy supply and demand with granular, site-specific accuracy. Our core product, Sunairio ONE, generates thousands of realistic scenarios (ensembles) to surface uncertainty and extreme-event risk so that traders, operators, and developers can manage volatility, optimize decisions, and plan for extreme events. This is not weather for weather’s sake. We translate weather and climate risk into high-impact grid and market outcomes.

About You

You are a technical leader in quantitative finance, energy economics, or machine learning who is a builder, not just a researcher. You have built models of complex systems, improved them, and shipped them into production. You aren't a traditional power engineer—you are a data-first, economic thinker who views the grid as a massive, stochastic market solution.

You have a founder mindset and are driven by impact. You may not be a founder, but you operate like one.

You have:

• High Autonomy: You identify the bottleneck in a model and fix it without a roadmap.
• Commercial Intuition: You build systems that create durable value for traders and developers, not just high R-squared values on a test set.

You are:

• A Technical Polymath: You are as comfortable tuning a Transformer model as you are analyzing ISO marginal loss vectors.
• Tool-Agnostic Experimentalist: You don't just use standard libraries; you leverage LLMs and Agentic AI to accelerate data ingestion, code generation, and market sentiment analysis; but you think critically about where LLM-based AI works and where it has the risk of going off the rails.

Why this role matters

The energy transition is making power markets increasingly volatile and non-linear. Traditional structural models are too slow, and "black box" ML often fails during extreme events. The industry needs a new breed of market modeling that blends physical fundamentals (transmission, heat rates, fuel prices) with machine learning methods. You will be the architect of this bridge, turning trillions of data points into the price signals that will guide the next decade of energy investment.

Key responsibilities

• Build Market Models: Design and deploy probabilistic models for power region fundamentals (load, renewables, unit outages), congestion, and LMP.
• Innovate with AI/LLMs: Integrate Large Language Models and Generative AI to parse regulatory filings, extract features from unstructured market reports, and automate complex data pipelines.
• Bridge Physical & Financial: Work with our weather and climate team to translate atmospheric signals into market-moving outcomes (basis risk, price spikes, and curtailment).
• Productionize & Scale: Partner with Engineering to ensure models are performant, scalable, and integrated into the Sunairio ONE platform.
• Market Strategy: Bring strong judgment on what matters to a power trader or a renewable developer, helping shape the product roadmap based on market reality.

What we’re looking for

• The "Builder" Proof: Clear evidence you have built an end-to-end modeling system (e.g., a price forecaster, a trading bot, or a grid simulator), not just tweaked existing code.
• ML Fluency: Deep expertise in modern machine learning applied to noisy, real-world numerical data.
• Energy Market Savvy: A strong grasp of how ISO/RTO markets function including an understanding of how supply stacks and transmission constraints drive price.
• Modern AI Stack: Experience or high proficiency in leveraging LLMs for data extraction or code acceleration.
• Technical Toolkit: Mastery of Python (NumPy, Pandas, Xarray) and experience with large-scale data orchestration.
• Probabilistic Mindset: Comfort with uncertainty, Bayesian inference, and the nuances of evaluating distributional fidelity rather than just point-forecast accuracy.
• High Velocity: A preference for shipping "version 1" quickly and iterating based on performance rather than seeking academic perfection.

What we offer

• The opportunity to join an industry-disrupting startup on the ground floor–with significant equity compensation
• The focus to work on innovative solutions to problems of critical importance
• A truly collaborative team environment
• The ability to help shape company culture
• Competitive salary and incentive-based compensation plan
• “Platinum” health insurance plan
• 401(k) with company match
• Flexible vacation policy

$150K - $190k

Location

• Sunairio is based in Baltimore, MD, and requires employees to travel to regularly-scheduled onsites at Sunairio HQ. Sunairio provides a travel stipend to cover these expenses. Relocation assistance is also available to candidates interested in moving close to Baltimore.

Equal Opportunity Employer

Sunairio is an equal opportunity employer that does not discriminate on the basis of race, color, religion, sex, national origin, disability, veteran status, marital status, age, sexual orientation, gender identity, or any other legally protected status. We are committed to a diverse workforce and an inclusive workplace environment.