Senior Facilities Engineer

Title: Critical Facilities/Infrastructure Engineer (Data Center/Server Room Cooling)

Location: San Jose, California

Work Arrangement: On-site

Employment Type: Contract

Compensation: $70.00–$100.00 per hour

Company Overview

Our client is an innovative technology company developing advanced hardware for high-performance computing and other demanding electronic applications. Its San Jose facility combines engineering, product development, testing, and computing operations in a fast-paced R&D environment.

Position Summary

The Senior Data Center / Server Room Infrastructure Engineer will serve as the owner’s technical representative for an infrastructure assessment and upgrade initiative supporting an on-site server room and high-density engineering environment.

This is not a hyperscale data-center campus or a network/cloud engineering position. The role focuses on the physical infrastructure supporting a smaller, business-critical computing environment, including electrical capacity, UPS systems, rack power, HVAC, cooling capacity, environmental monitoring, and facility modifications.

The selected engineer will assess the existing infrastructure, determine its readiness for future equipment installations, recommend necessary improvements, and coordinate vendors and contractors throughout project execution.

Responsibilities

• Serve as the primary technical owner for server-room infrastructure assessments, upgrades, and expansion projects.
• Evaluate existing electrical service, panels, circuits, UPS systems, PDUs, rack-level power, grounding, and backup-power capabilities.
• Assess server-room HVAC, cooling capacity, airflow, temperature and humidity control, environmental monitoring, and available redundancy.
• Calculate anticipated electrical and thermal loads associated with new servers, GPU systems, racks, and engineering equipment.
• Determine whether existing power and cooling systems can support planned equipment installations and future growth.
• Identify infrastructure limitations, reliability concerns, single points of failure, and operational risks.
• Develop practical upgrade recommendations, scopes of work, budgets, schedules, and project phasing plans.
• Coordinate electrical, HVAC, mechanical, low-voltage, controls, and specialty contractors.
• Work with building management, engineering consultants, equipment suppliers, IT personnel, and internal engineering teams.
• Review electrical one-line diagrams, panel schedules, mechanical drawings, equipment layouts, specifications, and contractor proposals.
• Oversee field installation activities and confirm compliance with approved designs, project requirements, applicable codes, and manufacturer recommendations.
• Coordinate planned outages, electrical cutovers, cooling modifications, and temporary infrastructure while minimizing disruption to active operations.
• Support equipment startup, testing, commissioning, punch-list completion, and project closeout.
• Maintain accurate records of infrastructure changes, equipment inventories, rack power assignments, cooling capacities, and as-built conditions.

Required Qualifications

• Bachelor’s degree in Electrical Engineering, Mechanical Engineering, Facilities Engineering, Construction Engineering, or a related technical discipline. Equivalent directly relevant experience may be considered.
• Seven or more years of experience supporting server rooms, enterprise data centers, high-density engineering labs, semiconductor facilities, research facilities, or other mission-critical technical environments.
• Experience assessing or upgrading electrical and cooling infrastructure supporting active computing equipment.
• Strong knowledge of:
• Electrical distribution, panels, circuits, and transformers
• UPS and battery-backup systems
• Power Distribution Units and rack PDUs
• Server-room HVAC and precision cooling
• Airflow and heat-load management
• Temperature, humidity, and environmental monitoring
• Generator or emergency-power systems
• Experience performing electrical-capacity, cooling-load, rack-density, or infrastructure-readiness assessments.
• Experience managing infrastructure renovation, equipment installation, or facility-upgrade projects in an occupied facility.
• Ability to read and interpret electrical one-line diagrams, mechanical drawings, equipment specifications, and construction documents.
• Strong contractor, vendor, and consultant management experience.
• Ability to manage project scope, budgets, schedules, technical risks, and competing stakeholder requirements.
• Strong written and verbal communication skills.

Preferred Qualifications

• Experience supporting hardware development, semiconductor, electronics, artificial-intelligence, or high-performance-computing environments.
• Familiarity with ASHRAE thermal guidelines for data-processing equipment.
• Experience with dedicated DX systems, split systems, small precision-cooling units, or building-supplied chilled-water systems.
• Knowledge of hot-aisle/cold-aisle layouts, airflow containment, rack-level heat loads, and localized cooling solutions.
• Experience with liquid-cooled computing or test infrastructure, including cooling distribution units, recirculating chillers, pumps, manifolds, heat exchangers, or leak-detection systems.
• Familiarity with building management systems, environmental monitoring, and infrastructure alarm systems.
• Experience with Schneider Electric/APC, Vertiv/Liebert, Eaton, or comparable power and cooling equipment.
• PMP certification or Professional Engineer licensure is a plus.

About the Opportunity

This is a highly visible opportunity to lead a critical infrastructure initiative within an advanced engineering organization. The selected consultant will help ensure that the company’s server-room environment can reliably support future computing and hardware-development requirements while maintaining safe, uninterrupted operations.