Sr. Project Engineer

Kaneka Americas Holding, Inc.; Pasadena (TX); On-site; USD 120,000 - 180,000; Full time

Job summary

Kaneka North America is hiring a Senior Project Engineer to lead capital projects from concept through closeout in a chemical/refinery environment. You will define objectives, scope, deliverables, and success criteria while ensuring alignment with safety, environmental, and lifecycle goals.

The role requires 5–10 years of related experience, strong skills in AutoCAD and MS Office, and proficiency with SAP. You will mentor teams, manage budgets and schedules, and coordinate with operations and

Qualifications

• Bachelors of Chemical Engineering required.
• 5 years: Engineering and Chemical or Refinery Operations required.
• 10 years: Engineering and Chemical or Refinery Operations required.
• Proficiency with AutoCAD, MS Office suite and SAP preferred.

Responsibilities

• Manage capital projects from initial concept through closeout across all phases.
• Establish project objectives, scope, deliverables, acceptance criteria and success measures.
• Ensure technical solutions align with safety, reliability, and lifecycle objectives.
• Monitor performance, risks, issues, and changes, coordinating mitigations.
• Develop and maintain schedules, budgets, forecasts, and resource plans.
• Lead cross-functional teams to meet safety, cost, schedule, and quality goals.
• Coordinate procurement and contractor management, including bid evaluations and contracts.

Skills

AutoCAD

SAP

MS PowerPoint

MS Word

MS Excel

MS Outlook

Education

Bachelors of Chemical Engineering (required)

Job description

Why Work at Kaneka North America?

At Kaneka North America, you'll find more than just a job-you'll find a place to build a career. We offer a peoplefirst, safetyfocused environment where employees are encouraged to learn, grow, and contribute. Whether you're early in your career or bringing years of experience, you'll have the chance to do meaningful work, collaborate across teams, and support products and industries that make a difference every day. Your contributions are valued, and your development is supported.

Our Culture & Values

Our culture is built on respect, teamwork, and doing things the right way. We believe people do their best work when they feel supported, trusted, and empowered to speak up and share ideas. Safety, integrity & trust, quality, and innovation guide everything we do, and we invest in our employees through continuous learning, collaboration, and opportunities for growth. At Kaneka North America, you're encouraged to take ownership of your work, grow your skills, and build a longterm career in an environment that values both accountability and people.

Essential duties and responsibilities

• Manage capital projects from initial concept through project closeout across Propose, Feasibility, Define, Execute, and Closeout phases.
• Establish project objectives, scope, deliverables, acceptance criteria, and success measures.
• Ensure technical solutions align with business, operational, safety, environmental, reliability, and lifecycle objectives.
• Monitor project performance and proactively address risks, issues, changes, and deviations.
• Develop and maintain project execution plans, schedules, budgets, forecasts, and resource plans.
• Provide clear and timely project status reports to leadership and stakeholders.
• Lead cross-functional project teams to achieve safety, cost, schedule, quality, and performance objectives.
• Develop, review, and maintain project estimates as definition matures from early screening through execution.
• Manage budgets, forecasts, commitments, expenditures, contingency, and cash flow.
• Evaluate change requests and communicate potential impacts to cost, schedule, scope, and project economics.
• Develop and maintain integrated project schedules, milestone plans, and critical-path visibility.
• Coordinate execution with plant operations, maintenance activities, outages, and turnaround schedules.
• Lead projects through a formal stage-gate or Front-End Loading (FEL) methodology.
• Facilitate gate reviews and secure required business, technical, and funding approvals.
• Ensure required phase deliverables are complete, appropriately reviewed, and documented before gate advancement.
• Prepare or coordinate funding authorization packages and gate review materials.
• Validate project readiness, definition maturity, and risk disposition before recommending advancement to the next phase.
• Manage engineering contractors, construction contractors, vendors, consultants, and specialist resources.
• Develop scopes of work and support bid evaluations, contractor selection, negotiations, and contract administration.
• Coordinate procurement of equipment, materials, and long-lead items.
• Monitor contractor performance, schedules, deliverables, safety, quality, and commercial compliance.
• Support construction planning, field execution, commissioning, startup, and turnover.
• Apply engineering principles and industry practices throughout project development and execution.
• Coordinate multidisciplinary engineering activities, including process, mechanical, piping, civil/structural, electrical, instrumentation and controls, and automation.
• Review engineering deliverables for completeness, constructability, operability, maintainability, and technical adequacy.
• Support design reviews, hazard reviews, risk assessments, Management of Change activities, and technical assurance reviews.
• Adhere to all safety policies onsite.
• Make recommendations for process/production and department improvements.
• Participate in project HAZOPs and PHAs.
• Participate in continued learning initiatives.
• Design and installation of non-process projects as required.
• Special projects and assignments as needed to support administration and technical labs.
• Field supervision of contractors and engineering firms.
• Coach, mentor, motivate and supervise project team members and contractors, and influence them to take positive action
• Mentor department interns and junior engineers when needed.
• Must demonstrate the following emotional intelligence skills:
  • Emotional Empathy
  • Positive Attitude
  • Excellent Communication Skills
  • Flexibility / Adaptability
  • Interpersonal Skills

Qualifications

Education

Bachelors of Chemical Engineering (required)

Experience

5 years: Engineering and Chemical or Refinery Operations (required)

10 years: Engineering and Chemical or Refinery Operations (required)

Skills

• AutoCAD (required)
• SAP (preferred)
• MS PowerPoint (required)
• MS Word (required)
• MS Excel (required)
• MS Outlook (required)

Equal Opportunity Employer/Protected Veterans/Individuals with Disabilities

This employer is required to notify all applicants of their rights pursuant to federal employment laws.

For further information, please review the Know Your Rights notice from the Department of Labor.