Fire Protection Engineer

Overview

Lead owner-side fire and life-safety engineering across large-scale data center programs, establishing design criteria and ensuring fire and life-safety requirements remain clear from design through construction, commissioning, and operational handover.

What you'll do

• Develop and maintain fire protection and life-safety design criteria, technical standards, and review requirements for self-build data center campuses.
• Review fire protection drawings, specifications, code analyses, fire and life-safety narratives, hydraulic calculations, equipment submittals, and sequences of operation across all project phases.
• Provide owner-side engineering direction for fire detection and alarm, automatic suppression, fire pumps and water storage, smoke control, emergency communication, and related life-safety systems.
• Integrate fire protection requirements with architectural, structural, electrical, mechanical, controls, security, hardware, and operational systems.
• Partner with code officials, authorities having jurisdiction, insurers, consultants, contractors, and equipment vendors to resolve code interpretations and approval risks.
• Support constructability reviews, RFIs, submittals, field inspections, deficiency resolution, and change management during active construction.
• Define commissioning, integrated-system testing, acceptance, turnover, and operational-readiness criteria for fire and life-safety systems.
• Assess fire and life-safety risks associated with high-density compute, battery and energy-storage systems, generators and fuel systems, utility infrastructure, cooling systems, hazardous materials, and construction activities.
• Support incident response, root-cause reviews, corrective actions, and lessons learned, translating operational findings into improved designs and standards.
• Maintain clear records of design decisions, code positions, approvals, testing results, open risks, and turnover requirements.
• Travel regularly to project sites to support design reviews, field execution, testing, commissioning, and operational readiness.

What you'll need

• Bachelor's degree in Fire Protection Engineering or a related engineering discipline, or equivalent practical experience delivering fire and life-safety systems.
• 8+ years of fire protection engineering experience supporting data centers, industrial facilities, advanced manufacturing, energy infrastructure, or other mission-critical environments.
• Strong knowledge of applicable building and fire codes and standards, including IBC, IFC, NFPA requirements, and local authority approval processes.
• Technical depth in fire alarm and detection, water-based suppression, special-hazard suppression, fire pumps and water supply, smoke control, egress, and integrated life-safety systems.
• Experience reviewing fire protection designs, specifications, hydraulic calculations, equipment submittals, testing procedures, and commissioning results.
• Demonstrated ability to work with authorities having jurisdiction, engineering consultants, contractors, insurers, vendors, and internal stakeholders.
• Experience resolving field issues and design changes while maintaining clear code compliance, safety, quality, schedule, and documentation.
• Strong written and verbal communication, sound engineering judgment, and the ability to create clarity when requirements or ownership are ambiguous.
• Professional Engineer licensure in Fire Protection Engineering, or the ability to obtain licensure in relevant jurisdictions.

Nice to have

• Experience with hyperscale data centers, high-density compute environments, or global multi-site infrastructure programs.
• Experience with battery rooms, energy-storage systems, generator plants, fuel systems, high-voltage substations, or other campus utility infrastructure.
• Familiarity with performance-based design, fire and smoke modeling, quantitative risk assessment, or fire-hazard analysis.
• Experience leading integrated testing and coordinating fire alarm, suppression, controls, security, mechanical, and electrical interfaces.
• Experience developing reusable standards, design templates, commissioning requirements, and incident-prevention programs across multiple sites.

Details

• Location: US, remote.
• Travel to project sites regularly.