Power Project Lead - Stargate

About the Team:

OpenAI, in close collaboration with our capital partners, is embarking on a journey to build the world’s most advanced AI infrastructure ecosystem. The Stargate team is central to this mission, setting the core infra strategy and implementing this vision. From site selection to the buildout process, this team sits at the intersection of commercial, technical, strategy, and operations, interacting with teams and executives inside and outside of OpenAI.

About the Role

The Utility & Power Project Lead ensures OpenAI’s data centers have reliable and scalable access to power and water. You will manage utility interconnection processes, negotiate agreements, and validate feasibility of candidate sites. Crucially, this role will serve as a project management and construction/enablement lead to ensure major power readiness projects progress on-time and in coordination with the broader infrastructure needs of OpenAI. This role is fundamentally focussed on project delivery.

Responsibilities

• Lead transmission/distribution interconnection strategy and queue management.
• Project and construction management and oversight for major power projects.
• Partner with utilities for behind the meter and in front of the meter projects.
• Partner in technical negotiation for ESAs, PPAs, VPPA, RECs, and water rights agreements.
• Collaborate with local water and sewer authorities to support site deployment.
• Manage relationships with utilities, ISOs, municipalities, and regulators.
• Partner with sustainability and engineering teams on renewable integration and resiliency.
• Track wholesale power and water market trends to inform site strategy.
• Collaboration and coordination with our engineering organization.
• Coordination with schedule and procurement with supply chain partners.

Qualifications

• 10+ years in power/utility procurement for hyperscale, industrial, or grid-intensive projects.
• Expertise in MV/HV transmission, interconnection studies, and utility contracting.
• Familiarity with water rights, treatment, reuse, and municipal contracting.
• Strong negotiation and relationship management skills.

About OpenAI

OpenAI is an AI research and deployment company dedicated to ensuring that general-purpose artificial intelligence benefits all of humanity. We push the boundaries of the capabilities of AI systems and seek to safely deploy them to the world through our products. AI is an extremely powerful tool that must be created with safety and human needs at its core, and to achieve our mission, we must encompass and value the many different perspectives, voices, and experiences that form the full spectrum of humanity.

We are an equal opportunity employer, and we do not discriminate on the basis of race, religion, color, national origin, sex, sexual orientation, age, veteran status, disability, genetic information, or other applicable legally protected characteristic.

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