Senior Mechanical Commissioning Project Engineer

OpenAI; San Francisco (CA); On-site; USD 140,000 - 180,000; Full time

Job summary

OpenAI is seeking a Mechanical Commissioning Project Engineer in San Francisco to lead planning, readiness, and test execution for critical mechanical systems. You will coordinate with design, vendors, and field teams to ensure startup, balancing, and controls verification support reliable facility performance.

You will oversee inspection strategy, vendor interfaces, and discipline-level review of results, maintaining dashboards and ensuring complete turnover documentation for operations.

Qualifications

• 8+ years of mechanical commissioning/related experience on complex infrastructure projects.
• Strong knowledge of mechanical startup, testing, controls interfaces, cooling/ventilation and hydronic systems.
• Experience reviewing commissioning specs, checklists, test scripts and reports.
• Ability to coordinate field execution across contractors, vendors and leadership.
• Strong judgment on readiness, safety, sequencing, prerequisites, risk escalation.
• Comfort working in construction environments with evolving schedules and multiple fronts.
• Clear technical writing and ability to maintain logs, test evidence and decisions.
• Ability to be onsite during critical installation, startup, checkout and testing.

Responsibilities

• Develop and maintain the mechanical commissioning scope, readiness criteria, inspection strategy, and test execution plan.
• Coordinate QA/QC inspections with contractors and vendors, including deficiency tracking and closeout.
• Own commissioning procedure development, equipment startup, functional testing and controls verification.
• Coordinate with vendors on acceptance requirements, startup support, and test documentation.
• Support readiness and execution for cooling, ventilation, hydronic, pumping and controls systems.
• Lead review of test results, deficiencies, corrective actions, retests and trend logs.
• Maintain commissioning dashboards and status inputs for risk, resources and readiness.
• Collaborate with Electrical commissioning lead on cross-discipline dependencies and integrated testing.
• Support turnover with complete documentation, as-built evidence and test records.

Skills

Mechanical commissioning

Field engineering

Startup

Testing

Balancing coordination

Controls verification

Documentation/logs

Written communication

On-site presence

Safety readiness

Job description

OpenAI is seeking a Mechanical Commissioning Project Engineer in San Francisco to lead planning, readiness, and test execution for critical mechanical systems. You will coordinate with design, vendors, and field teams to ensure startup, balancing, and controls verification support reliable facility performance.

You will oversee inspection strategy, vendor interfaces, and discipline-level review of results, maintaining dashboards and ensuring complete turnover documentation for operations.