Senior Reliability Engineer

Omaha Public Power District; Omaha (NE); On-site; USD 99,000 - 121,000; Full time

Job summary

Omaha Public Power District in Omaha, Nebraska seeks a Senior Reliability Engineer to centralize equipment reliability efforts, improving maintenance strategies and PM standards while ensuring optimal spare parts and asset reliability. You will analyze failure modes, develop performance metrics, and lead root cause investigations to strengthen fleet performance.

The role emphasizes coaching teams, embedding reliability in capital projects, and driving a disciplined, data-driven maintenance

Qualifications

• PE license in Nebraska or eligible for reciprocity within 6 months.
• Demonstrated ability to lead complex engineering tasks, analyses, and long-term solutions.
• Experience managing engineering project components and multi-disciplinary collaboration.
• Ability to develop and refine engineering standards, procedures, and best practices.
• Strong judgment in identifying technical risks and implementing mitigation strategies.
• Ability to coach, mentor, and develop less-experienced engineers.

Responsibilities

• Drive enterprise Operational Excellence by guiding implementation of OPPD’s Equipment Reliability and Asset Management roadmap.
• Lead complex engineering evaluations, diagnosing issues and developing technical solutions.
• Oversee engineering workstreams across multiple disciplines to ensure integration and quality.
• Advance organizational capability by developing new tools, methodologies, and technical approaches.
• Champion risk identification and mitigation to reduce operational, safety, and reliability risks.
• Manage fleet reliability initiatives that influence maintenance strategy, system performance, and risk-based decision making.
• Lead reliability risk interpretation and communicate system behaviors, failure modes, and performance issues.
• Develop high-reliability culture by coaching, mentoring, and strengthening operational judgment across teams.

Skills

PE License

Leadership

Root cause analysis

Project management

Tools

CMMS

Job description

Position Overview

Omaha Public Power District (OPPD) provides affordable, reliable, and environmentally responsible energy to the communities we serve. As a publicly owned utility, OPPD is committed to operational excellence, innovation, and long-term asset reliability.

The Senior Reliability Engineer will centralize efforts related to equipment reliability by improving maintenance strategies, creating standard work packets, developing or refining preventive maintenance (PM) standards, and ensuring sites maintain appropriate critical spares. This role strengthens fleet performance by systematically prioritizing assets, analyzing failure modes and historical data, building and evaluating reliability KPIs and statistical models, leading root cause investigations, identifying design and commissioning weaknesses, monitoring operational practices, optimizing maintenance strategies and work order quality, and auditing PM/CBM tasks for effectiveness.

This position will manage fleet reliability growth by developing optimized maintenance strategies, implementing corrective actions from causal analyses, directing updates to engineering standards and operating procedures, overseeing improvements with maintenance and operations teams, leading strategic shifts after major failures, supporting spare-parts justification, expanding condition monitoring programs, embedding reliability principles in capital projects, supporting training for operators and technicians, tracking reliability initiatives, and managing risk through structured risk registers or risk-based maintenance frameworks.

You will also influence organizational change by coaching teams, promoting high-reliability behaviors, empowering sound decision-making, fostering a disciplined questioning attitude, teaching system-thinking, modeling accountable leadership, and reinforcing processes and procedures so they become sustainable daily habits that drive long-term reliability improvements.

The Impact You’ll Have

• Drive enterprise Operational Excellence by guiding implementation of OPPD’s Equipment Reliability and Asset Management roadmap
• Lead complex engineering evaluations, diagnosing issues and developing technical solutions
• Oversee engineering workstreams across multiple disciplines to ensure integration and quality
• Advance organizational capability by developing new tools, methodologies, and technical approaches
• Champion risk identification and mitigation to reduce operational, safety, and reliability risks
• Manage fleet reliability initiatives that influence maintenance strategy, system performance, and risk-based decision making
• Lead reliability risk interpretation and communicate system behaviors, failure modes, and performance issues
• Develop high-reliability culture by coaching, mentoring, and strengthening operational judgment across teams

What You’ll Bring

• Ability to successfully perform essential reliability engineering duties
• Registration as a Professional Engineer (PE) in Nebraska, or eligibility for reciprocity within 6 months
• Demonstrated ability to lead complex engineering tasks, analyses, and long-term solutions
• Experience managing engineering project components and multi-disciplinary collaboration
• Ability to develop and refine engineering standards, procedures, and best practices
• Strong judgment in identifying technical risks and implementing mitigation strategies
• Demonstrated ability to coach, mentor, and develop less‑experienced engineers

Preferred Experiences

• Reliability engineering, RCM, condition monitoring, or asset management background
• Experience leading causal analyses or root cause investigations
• Statistical modeling, KPI analysis, or reliability analytics
• Experience with CMMS systems or work order quality initiatives
• Industrial or power‑generation experience
• Experience driving cultural change, operational discipline, and reliability‑focused behaviors

• Time Demands: This role is considered a non-essential role, however, this role may be required to report to work to support the restoration of normal business operations.
• This position must be available for overtime work and callouts as required to ensure continuance of efficient operation.
• Work Location:
• Office: Work will be performed in a modern office environment amid normal conditions of dust, odors, fumes, and noises.
• Field: Work will be performed outside in a wide variety of weather conditions (snow, rain, heat, cold, wind, etc.), terrain, and other natural environmental hazards as well as pollen and other airborne allergens.
• Generation Plant: Work will be performed inside with exposure to industrial building conditions and will be exposed to extreme temperatures, odors, dust, gases, poor ventilation and exposure to sounds. Noise levels may require shouting to be heard.
• Work Environment:
• Work will be performed in high traffic environments.
• Will work around energies high voltage electrical equipment.
• Will work in construction areas that present many physical hazards.
• Will work at heights.
• Will work in closed or confined spaces.
• Will work around asbestos and lead.
• Physical Demands:
• Minimal physical effort typically found in clerical work. Primarily sedentary, may occasionally lift and carry light objects. Walking and/or standing as needed and minimal.
• Light to moderate physical effort that includes frequent standing or walking or maintaining arms and hands in the same position for repetitive tasks. Frequently works with light objects and light hand tools.
• Salary/Wage Info
• Grade: S6
• Minimum: $109,942
• Midpoint: $137,428

The OPPD Difference

Our Culture & Mission

At Omaha Public Power District, everything starts with people. Our teams, our communities, and the customer owners who count on us. As the 12th largest public power utility in the U.S., we serve more than 900,000 people across 13 counties, and we take that responsibility serious.

We lead with integrity, support one another, and do what is right because how we serve matters just as much as what we deliver. Our goal is simple: provide affordable, reliable, and environmentally responsible energy today and for generations to come.

We create power with purpose. Your work here has real impact on families, the environment, and on the future of energy. And we believe great ideas can come from anywhere.

If you want to be part of a team that takes care of the community and the people who serve it, you are in the right place. We back up our mission by taking care of our employees, too, which is why our benefits are among the most comprehensive and competitive in the region.

EOE: Protected Veterans/Disability