Southside Electric Cooperative is seeking a career-minded System Engineer to join our Engineering team. While the average US worker will have 12 jobs in a lifetime, here at SEC we are proud of our legacy of careers that last through retirement. That’s right, most employees who come to SEC stay through retirement. Why?

• As a Cooperative, we don’t just have customers, we serve members who are also Cooperative owners. We pride ourselves on living in our service areas and being active members of our communities. Our employees are volunteer firefighters, coaches, National Guardsmen, and more.
•  We believe that the best ideas can come from anywhere – even our newest employees. When we are working towards the same goal, the quality of the solution will always outweigh the source. Ask questions, share answers, and challenge expectations. It's not about what you can accomplish individually, it's about impacting what we can accomplish together.
•  Because Southside Electric Cooperative employees take great care of our members and our electrical systems, we reward them with a very competitive salary and an excellent benefits package that includes employer funded health, dental, vision, life insurance for employees and generous contributions to dependent benefits; HSA, HRA, 401(k), retirement plan, full tuition reimbursement, and more.

What Will You Do For SEC?

As System Engineer – Distributed Energy Resources, you will be responsible for providing review, oversight, and design of the Cooperative’s electrical distribution and transmission systems including the study, design, and project management of distributed generation, battery storage, and alternative fuel vehicle projects. You will apply your knowledge and skills to ensure that our transmission system, substations, and distribution system meet all present and future system protection and interconnection requirements necessary to render safe, efficient, and reliable service to our members at the lowest possible cost in accordance with RUS specifications, the National Electric Safety Code, and the Cooperative’s policies, rules, and regulations. Additionally, you will be instrumental in gathering data to support various system improvement funding opportunities.

Your essential tasks will include, but are not limited to:

• Assist/manage the review of distributed generation facilities, battery storage facilities, and electric vehicle charging equipment. Such activity will also include support for the Cooperative’s Energy Management Advisor related to member net metering installations and the project management of various utility-scale interconnection requests.
• Multi-departmental collaboration regarding DER evaluation and implementation.
• Perform training activities related to renewables and DER.
• Perform system data analytics from SCADA, OMS, and the AMI system.
• Collaborate with various departments to capitalize on system improvement funding opportunities.
• Review applicable IEEE, CRN, and other industry standards for identifying utility best practices regarding the application and maintenance of equipment and technology.
• Assist in maintaining and updating the Cooperative’s system over-current coordination and system over-voltage coordination studies.
• Assist with the investigation of all system protection mis-coordination events and protective device mis-operation events and generate root cause analysis reports.
• Monitor equipment failures, analyze failure trends, and interface with equipment manufacturers to resolve failure issues and provide findings to the System Professional Engineer – Protection & Standards and the Vice President of Engineering & Operations.
• Perform periodic (follow-up) substation inspections to ensure settings and coordination.
• Aid other Cooperative employees with training on new protective or line equipment.
• Assist with the maintenance and update the Cooperative’s Arc Flash Hazard Assessment and provide periodic training to Cooperative employees.
• Respond to requests from the membership related to short-circuit studies and arc-flash studies.
• Assist the System Professional Engineer – System Protection & Standards in the development of construction work plans and long-range work plans.
• Participate in preparing the annual budget for the Engineering department.
• Work with various electrical consultants to provide information, oversight, and contractual review for services provided to the Cooperative.
• Check the accuracy of work returned by consulting engineering firms and/or contractors.
• Assist with the installation, upgrade, maintenance, troubleshooting, testing, calibration, programming, and operation of substation protective relaying
• Review and evaluate new transmission, substation, and distribution equipment and technology. Make recommendations to meet current and future Engineering and Operations standards and expectations. 
• Participate in the development of transmission and distribution substation designs.
• Assist the Purchasing Agent with review and identification of new equipment for use on the distribution and transmission system.
• Meet with sales engineers to discuss specifications and available materials, and their application to the Cooperative’s system.
• Assist the Operations group with the review of power quality data from residential and commercial member locations.
• Aid in determining transformer, conductor, and service sizing from load information provided by the member and other sources.
• Review and measure distribution and substation equipment grounding, and make recommendations for improvements, as needed, based on system over-voltage coordination studies.
• Assist the System Engineer (GIS and Planning) in the posting of construction work orders to the Cooperative’s Geographic Information System (GIS) as needed.
• Provide system operator support in the Dispatch Center as needed for large-scale system outages.
• Assist with monthly outage reliability reports (as required) from the OMS system and other reliability and system loading reports as required for system planning.
• Review and recommend voltage optimization projects that will impact the Cooperative’s demand billing.

• Be an active participant in VMDAEC engineering or other related working groups.

Who You Are

You are unfailingly dependable and reliable; work well alone or with others; and are self-motivated and capable of functioning without supervision.

In addition to a bachelor’s degree in in electrical engineering or electrical engineering technology, you have at least two years of electrical engineering experience, preferably in the areas of distribution line design, distribution system planning, and relay protection. The experience requirements may be adjusted with the appropriate formal education and applicable work experience.

You have a Professional Engineer’s (PE) license in the Commonwealth of Virginia, or you are able and committed to obtaining one within 4 years of hire. If you are licensed in a state other than Virginia, a PE license in Virginia must be acquired within 180 days from date of hire.

You must be able to gain familiarity with IEEE 1547 within 90 days of hire.

Knowledge

• General knowledge of distributed energy resources and inverter-based technologies such as solar and battery storage
• Must be familiar with net metering concepts.
• Must have a general knowledge of grid altering technology
• Must have sound knowledge of transmission, distribution, and substation system protection theory and application.
• General knowledge of protective relays.
• General knowledge of SCADA and Downline Automation (DA) networks.
• General knowledge of transmission, substation, and distribution apparatus, including breakers, circuit switchers, power transformers, voltage regulators, reclosers, sectionalizers, and capacitors.
• Must have sound prior programming experience.
• General knowledge of the National Electric Safety Code, National Electric Code, EPA, and OSHA Utility Standards, as well as local and state codes.

Physical & Mental Requirements

• You can work steadily for prolonged periods of time, working with several people, doing a variety of tasks, with many interruptions, deadlines, requiring a high degree of accuracy and under a heavy workload, if necessary.
• You can walk a mile over uneven terrain, jump ditches, and any other requirement associated with power line construction and right-of-way clearing, to observe work.
• You are able to lift and carry up to 75 pounds.
• You have acute consciousness of safety and a positive attitude toward accident prevention.
• You can handle high pressure situations with professionalism.

Because we are an electric utility, on occasion, we must come together to serve our members in times of crisis. This often means coming to work in less-than-ideal conditions, but you share our passion for service and are willing to answer when called including emergencies that take place at night, on the weekends, and during holidays.

 The selected candidate must live or be willing to locate to within 60 minutes of our Headquarters office in Crewe, VA. Relocation assistance will be considered for highly qualified candidates.

Documents to establish identity and employment eligibility are required. Offers of employment are conditional upon a negative alcohol and controlled substance test.

All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, age, national origin, disability, or veteran status.

WE ARE AN EQUAL OPPORTUNITY PROVIDER AND EMPLOYER.

About Southside Electric Cooperative

SEC strives to provide safe, reliable electricity and related services at the highest value to our member-owners. We exist to enhance the quality of life of the communities in which we serve and live. We achieve this mission by our actions that demonstrate integrity, fiscal responsibility, member engagement, community involvement, and by living out the cooperative principles. The relationship we have with the member-owners of SEC matters to us, and we work hard every day to prove this through our actions. We recognize that our member-owners expect to receive a quality of service which surpasses that typically associated with simply being a “customer” of an investor-owned utility. Our four district offices are located in the areas where we serve, and our employees live in these areas as well. Our employees are very active in our communities and participate in a number of ways to improve the areas in which they live. SEC employees are active volunteer fire fighters, EMTs, first responders, youth sports coaches, and Sunday school teachers, to name a few. Making Southside Virginia a better place to live and work is very important to us. It is inherent in our mission as a cooperative and it is a commitment we make, not only to our members but to our co-workers and our families.

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