Vice President Project Development - CO280

BLANKSLATE Partners; Denver (CO); Hybrid; USD 250,000 - 350,000; Full time

Job summary

CO280, a North America-focused low-carbon infrastructure platform, seeks a Vice President of Project Development to lead origination, strategy, and partnerships for gigawatt-scale data center energy projects. You will own development from concept to Final Investment Decision, coordinating with utilities, hosts, OEMs, EPCs, hyperscalers, and investors.

Preference for Houston, Dallas, Denver, or Vancouver with at least 30% travel, and a track record delivering utility-scale projects from inception

Qualifications

• 15+ years of project development experience in power/energy infrastructure with a track record from origination to FID.
• An established executive network across utilities, IPPs, OEMs, EPCs, investors, or hyperscalers.
• Proven ability to originate and commercialize new infrastructure opportunities with sophisticated corporate customers and partners.
• Deep experience developing utility-scale power infrastructure: generation, transmission, interconnection, permitting, and site development; hyperscale data centers desirable.

Responsibilities

• Drive new low-carbon power projects from origination through FID, then support the project engineering team commercially through construction to commercial operation.
• Develop CO280’s project origination strategy by matching industrial host sites with hyperscaler demand, transmission availability, fiber infrastructure and regional power market opportunities.
• Own the development budget and project economics for each project through stage-gates to FID, including scenario and sensitivity analysis on key inputs.
• Build executive relationships with utilities, industrial hosts, hyperscalers, neoclouds, data center developers, OEMs, EPCs, gas suppliers, and strategic partners across the project value chain.
• Negotiate contracts with project partners, working closely with project engineering, finance, legal, community engagement, and commercial teams.
• Partner with the commercial team to map the hyperscaler and AI-buyer channel end-to-end, translating buyer needs into project design and the development roadmap.
• Partner with engineering to develop technically robust, financially viable and bankable projects; coordinate studies and relationships with OEM and EPC partners.
• Align with finance to ensure projects are bankable, supporting project economic models and corporate financing activities.
• Manage the operating cadence — stage-gates, risk registers, development-budget discipline, and project economic performance.
• Build and lead the project development team: hiring, operating cadence, stage-gate process, and development budgets.
• Shape CO280’s long-term infrastructure strategy as a member of the executive leadership team, defining where the business plays and how it scales.

Skills

Executive leadership

Strategic partnerships

Business development

Commercial acumen

Relationship building

Negotiation

Stakeholder management

Job description

Reports to: CEO

Location: Hybrid – North America (HQ: Vancouver, BC)

About CO280

CO280 is a leading developer of low-carbon industrial infrastructure projects. As a top 3 global BECCS developer, we hold more than $1B in signed CDR offtakes from buyers including Microsoft, Google, JPMorgan, Salesforce, and Stripe. We pioneered BECCS in North America, partnering with the continent’s largest pulp and paper companies to retrofit mills with carbon capture and sequestration and deliver permanent carbon removal at scale.

We are now expanding to deliver low-carbon power solutions across the data center market, applying key advantages we alreadypossess:trustedhyperscalerrelationships, a portfolio of pre-qualified industrial sites,expertiseinenergy and CCS project developmentand access to capital. We’ve identified and pre-qualified more than 20 industrial sites representing approximately 6 GW of potential capacity — not just parcels of land, but strategic infrastructure platforms with existing industrial zoning, water rights,transmission access, and established host relationships that dramatically compress development timelines in a market where speed-to-power is everything.

This is the rare moment when a market this large is gated by a problem this specific. The AI buildout is the defining industrial expansion of the decade, and power is the constraint holding it back, with interconnection queues running four to sevenyearsand the industry defaulting to unabated gas it does not want to burn. CO280 is building the platform that answers it.

You’lljoin a close-knit team of entrepreneurial, collaborative, andtransparent operators who have developed, delivered, and scalednew technologiesand industrial infrastructure across multiple verticals.We believe clean power must be practical, bankable, and scalable to move the needle on net zero and earn sociallicense. If you want to help build the projects the energytransition is waiting on, this is a seat at the table.

The Role

TheVice President Project Developmentwill build and lead CO280’slow carbon powerdata center infrastructure platform — owning project origination, development strategy, strategic partnerships, and the project development organization. You willidentify, originate, secure, and advance gigawatt-scale infrastructure opportunities from concept through Final Investment Decision (FID), working across utilities, industrial hosts, OEMs, EPCs,hyperscalers, AI developers, and capital partners to turn strategic sites into bankable projects.

This is a relationship-driven leadership role. Success will depend as much on the executive relationships you bring as the projectsyou’vedelivered. Existing relationships acrosshyperscalers,neoclouds, data center developers, utilities, power developers,OEMs, EPCs, infrastructure investors, andotherstrategic partners will enable CO280 to originate opportunities faster and build projects that competitors cannot.

Solutions may span gas-to-power + CCS, biomass, and solar with storage — owned andoperatedby CO280 and/or with partners. You own development through FID; at FID, the project engineering team leads execution, with your continued commercial support through construction to commercial operation.

This role exists because the AI industry has discovered thatcompute isno longer constrained by chips —it’sconstrained by power. Every majorhyperscaleris competing to secure gigawatts of generation capacity while utilities face interconnection queues measured in years. CO280 is uniquely positioned to solve that problem by combining strategic industrial sites, deep customer relationships, and proven infrastructure developmentexpertise. TheVice President Project Developmentwill convert those advantages into one of North America’s largest low-carbon infrastructure portfolios.

Your first 12–18 months will include:

• BuildingCO280’sproject development function and playbook.

• Converting pre-qualified host sites intodata center-ready opportunities.

• Securing the company’s first anchor AI infrastructure customers.

• Advancing the first one or two projects to Final Investment Decision.

Key Responsibilities

Origination & Development

• Drive new low-carbon power projects from origination through FID, then support the project engineering team commercially through construction to commercial operation.

• Develop CO280’s project origination strategy by matching industrial host sites withhyperscalerdemand,transmission availability, fiberinfrastructureand regional power market opportunities.

• Own the development budget and project economics for each project through stage-gates to FID, including scenario and sensitivity analysis on key inputs.

Partnerships & Commercial

• Build executive relationships with utilities, industrial hosts,hyperscalers,neoclouds, data centerdevelopers, OEMs, EPCs, gas suppliers, and strategic partners across the project value chain.

• Negotiate contracts withprojectpartners, working closely withprojectengineering,finance, legal, community engagement, and commercial teams.

• Partner with the commercial team to map thehyperscalerand AI-buyer channel end-to-end,translating buyer needs directly into project design and the development roadmap.

Cross-Functional Delivery

• Partner withengineering to develop technically robust, commercially attractive, and financeable projects,including coordinating studies, andbuilding relationships with OEM and EPC partners.

• Align withfinance to ensure projects are bankable, supporting project economic models and corporate/project financing activities.

• Manage the operating cadence — stage-gates, risk registers, development-budget discipline, and project economic performance.

Leadership & Strategy

• Build and lead the project development team: hiring, operating cadence, stage-gate process, and development budgets.

• Shape CO280’s long-term infrastructure strategy as a member of the executive leadership team, defining where the business plays, how it wins, and how it scales.

• Serve on the executive leadership team and represent CO280 externally with customers, partners, investors, and industry stakeholders.

This is an opportunity to build one of North America’s leading AI infrastructure development platforms at the point where energy, industrial redevelopment and hyperscale computing converge.

Location

Preference for Houston, Dallas,DenverorVancouverbut these locations are not a requirement.

Atleast 30% travel across North America

Qualifications

We’relooking for a leader who combines:

• A proventrack recorddeveloping large-scale energy infrastructure projects through final Investment Decision.

• The entrepreneurial mindset to build a new business in a rapidly evolving market.

• The commercial,financialand relationship-building capability to originate, structure and finance bankable infrastructure projects.

Required

• 15+ years of relevant project development experience in power, energy infrastructure, or digital infrastructure, withatrack recordof taking projects from origination to FID and, ideally, to COD.

• An established executive network across utilities, Independent Power Producers, OEMs, EPCs, infrastructure developers, investors, orhyperscalerinfrastructure teams.

• Demonstrated success originating and commercializing new infrastructure opportunities with sophisticated corporate customers and partners.

• Deep experience developing utility-scale power infrastructure: generation,transmission, interconnection, permitting, and site development. Experience supporting hyperscale data centers is highly desirable but not essential.

• Strong commercial,financialand engineering fluency, with the ability to structure bankable infrastructure projects and communicate effectively with technical,commercialand investment stakeholders.

• Demonstrated ability to contribute to term sheets and definitive agreements with sophisticated counterparties —hyperscalers, AI-native buyers, industrial hosts, midstream operators, or strategic investors.

• Experience building and running a development team, with clear views on stage-gates, risk allocation, and development budgets.