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Salary: USD 155,000 - 185,000 / annual
R-Zero is hiring a Staff Analytics Engineer to serve as the engineering authority behind the company's building analytics platform. You will be responsible for ensuring that every finding R-Zero surfaces to customers is defensible, that savings claims are rigorous, and that control actions are safe to deploy. This is a technical leadership role at a startup tackling energy and carbon reduction in commercial buildings through occupancy sensing, BMS data integration, and HVAC optimization.
You will own the quality and validation of R-Zero's rule library, working across discovery, measurement & verification (M&V), and control implementation. Your responsibilities include: validating findings against trend and building data; growing the rule library with new, impact-prioritized rules; investigating buildings like an energy auditor to uncover savings beyond existing rules; qualifying new buildings and deciding which equipment to monitor; building defensible M&V methodologies; implementing control safely through BACnet priority arrays; leading technical reviews with customer engineering and facilities teams; and scaling the review process as the fleet grows.
You will also own the grading playbook that documents judgment calls behind findings validation, write actionable defect reports for engineering, define new M&V methodologies when standard approaches don't fit, and make control-readiness calls. This role requires deep hands-on expertise in HVAC systems, building controls, and energy engineering, combined with the ability to work directly with time-series data and communicate technical findings to customers.
The role includes up to 15% travel for customer technical reviews, site validation, and deployment support, including overnight trips and mechanical room access.
**REQUIREMENTS**
Required qualifications (expected on day one):
- Evidence grading and system characterization: ability to judge trust levels of building facts from various sources (assumptions, datasets, documents, trends, on-site confirmation); extract system configuration from drawings, submittals, nameplate photos, and test-and-balance reports; resolve conflicts and assess fitness for action.
- Finding validation: review findings against trend and building data to make defensible calls; distinguish failed sensors or offline controllers from real equipment faults; confirm BACnet point identity from behavior; prove from trends which unit serves which zone.
- Hands-on data analysis: pull and analyze time-series data directly through AI agents (e.g., Claude), analytics platforms, or code; maintain skepticism about query results and agent outputs.
- Priority-array control: implement control through BACnet priority array, including write priority, relinquish defaults, and operator override collisions, not only through BMS programming.
- Sequences of operations: write sequences of operations or control strategies grounded in ASHRAE Guideline 36.
- Airside depth: working depth in AHUs, VAV, and terminal units; working knowledge of central plant and hydronic systems.
- M&V fundamentals: apply IPMVP in real buildings; map BACnet points to M&V calculation variables.
- Customer technical leadership: experience leading technical reviews with customer engineering or facilities staff.
- Experience and education: 8+ years of hands-on experience in HVAC design, controls or BMS engineering, energy engineering, commissioning, or building analytics. Bachelor's degree in Mechanical Engineering, Building Science, Controls Engineering, Energy Engineering, or related field, or equivalent demonstrated practice.
Preferred qualifications:
- Central plant depth: expertise in chillers, boilers, towers, and hydronic distribution sufficient to own plant rules and savings.
- Standards application: hands-on experience applying ASHRAE 62.1 and 90.1 in real buildings.
Nice-to-haves:
- Background at MEP or energy consultancy, commissioning/retro-commissioning firm, FDD/building analytics company, or early-stage startup.
- Hands-on experience with BACnet integrations and Niagara/Tridium supervisors.
- Experience building or tuning FDD rules at fleet scale.
- Familiarity with Python, SQL, or similar tools for time-series analysis.
- Exposure to DCV, IAQ, or smart building product categories; familiarity with Title 24.
- Industry credentials: PE, CEM, CMVP, CCP, or CEA.
