Project Manager – Transmission Projects

Environmental Science Associates (ESA) is a 100% employee-owned environmental consulting firm. We plan design permit mitigate and restore for projects across our communities infrastructure systems open spaces and wildlands. We are 50 years strong in 21 offices across California the Pacific Northwest and the Southeastern United States.

ESA is looking for a highly motivated Project Manager to lead transmission projects including overhead and underground lines substations gridmodernization work and related electrical infrastructure. In addition to excellent clientservice skills and the ability to build longterm relationships with utilities and energyinfrastructure partners the candidate excels in identifying strategic direction supporting businessdevelopment initiatives and recognizing highvalue transmission opportunities. This role is ideal for a collaborative deliveryfocused professional eager to help advance grid reliability and cleanenergy infrastructure in the West. The ideal candidate brings10 years of experience and a bachelors or masters degree in environmental management planning project management or a related field. He/She shall lead transmission and gridinfrastructure projects from early concept through construction support. The ideal candidate is passionate about enabling the cleanenergy transition and brings full lifecycle transmission experience including: early feasibility and constraints screening; siting and routing studies (alternatives development fatalflaw/constraints analysis route comparison and selection and constructability understanding); managing environmental field studies conducting datadriven impact analyses; permitting strategy and execution across federal state and local authorities; rightofway (ROW) strategy and coordination; and environmental compliance during preconstruction and construction (mitigation monitoring reporting).

Who You Are

• Strong knowledge of the full transmission project lifecycle from early study areas and corridor development through routing siting design permitting construction compliance and O&M.
• Experience in ISO/RTO transmission needs assessments and planning processes how transmission projects are identified studied prioritized and approved and where project development must align with interconnection reliability and policydriven needs.
• Has experience managing the full project life cycle from proposals through daytoday execution and closeout.
• A minimum of 10 years of relevant experience and a bachelors degree.
• A deep understanding of the regulatory landscape governing transmission infrastructure and a track record of managing complex multi-disciplinary projects throughout the life cycle not just task or phase management.
• Understand the big picture and how project development construction operations and maintenance of transmission projects work.
• Develops project strategy brings ideas to evolving gridinfrastructure needs.
• Is proficient with project management tools (MS Project Smartsheet etc.) builds predecessors and successors across all phases of electric transmission projects and captures routing environmental studies agency reviews land/ROW procurement interfaces outage windows and construction compliance.
• Is proactive organized and skilled at anticipating challenges before they arise.
• Demonstrates strong clientservice instincts and builds trusted longterm relationships.
• Excels at managing scope schedules and tracking budgets to keep projects on target.
• Delivers highquality work products with rigorous attention to detail.
• Communicates clearly both in writing and verbally while collaborating effectively with technical teams permitting staff and project partners.
• Is a proactive communicator with clients and project team members.
• Is comfortable managing a wide range of tasks beyond core technical expertise.
• Has a proven track record in proposal writing and business development including leveraging an existing network.
• Able to travel to project team meetings clients leadership site visits agency meetings and public stakeholder engagements in support of projects and clients.

What You Will Do for ESA

Business Development & Strategy

• Lead or support the development of proposals scopes schedules and budgets; contribute to contract negotiations as needed.
• Participate in client meetings industry events and conferences to represent ESA and promote our transmissioninfrastructure services.
• Leverage your professional network and build and maintain strong relationships with utility partners engineering firms contractors and regulatory agencies to support business development and grow ESAs transmission portfolio.
• Engage with clients to understand needs identify pursuits and gather intel to preposition the firm for success.
• Adept at identifying opportunities within the transmission sector including emerging regulatory and regional trends that influence project viability and competitive positioning.

Project Leadership & Execution

• Manage the full life cycle from conceptual planning and proposal development through construction support and closeout with an emphasis on transmissionspecific sequencing.
• Oversee project scope schedule budget and quality ensuring deliverables meet ESAs standards and are completed on time and within budget.
• Develop and maintain integrated logiclinked schedules.
• Proactively identify risks and critical path (e.g. survey seasons specialstatus species windows cultural discoveries outage constraints landowner access supplychain lead times) and drive mitigation and recovery strategies.
• Lead preparation review and QA/QC of technical documents: routing studies alternatives analyses constraints/fatalflaw assessments environmental technical reports permit applications mitigation plans and compliance plans. Ensuring accuracy clarity and regulatory defensibility.

Siting & Routing Environmental Studies and Compliance

• Understand and lead your team through siting and routing from opportunity screening through preferred route selection including criteria development GISbased constraints and sensitive habitat mapping comparative evaluations constructability.
• Scope and manage environmental field studies (biological cultural wetlands/waters visual/noise air/GHG EMF summaries soils/erosion hazardous materials) safety and data management.
• Translate study results into clear impact analyses avoidance/minimization measures and mitigation strategies; integrate resource constraints into the route and schedule.
• Lead environmental compliance during preconstruction and construction: develop and implement mitigation monitoring and reporting plans (MMRPs) environmental training contractor compliance checklists stopwork and variance procedures and closeout documentation.

Permitting & Interagency Coordination

• Develop permitting roadmaps and manage endtoend approvals with local state and federal agencies (e.g. CUPs coastal/shoreline or scenic permits where applicable Section 404/401 Section 7/10 consultations cultural resources reviews rightofentry/survey permits encroachment and crossing permits).
• Coordinate with counties cities public works state land departments state utility commissions (where applicable) federal land managers and other stakeholders.

ISO/RTO Transmission Needs Planning & Interconnection Awareness

• Understand how ISO/RTO planning identifies transmission needs (reliability deliverability and policydriven) how projects enter the needs assessment are evaluated and potentially selected for development.
• Coordinate project assumptions and understand route feasibility with utility planning and where relevant interconnection queue status to ensure consistency between permitting deliverables and gridplanning needs.

Whats Special About ESA

At ESA we spend our days helping to keep the environment in balance and we want to help keep your life in balance tooby providing benefits such as medical dental and vision insurance (paid at 70% for you AND your family) a 401(k) plan with company match an employee stock ownership program and paid vacation sick leave and holidays to name a few.

No matter what stage you are at in your career we provide opportunities for continued growth development and recognition. Whether you want to further your technical expertise sharpen your business acumen or help lead the next generation of employee-owners we want to support you in reaching your career goals. We believe these efforts will not only benefit you but will also benefit all ESA colleagues and clients. Specific programs we offer include tuition reimbursement professional development bonuses and attendance at conferences.

Who We Are

We are a 100% employee-owned environmental consulting firm who values diversity and inclusion and celebrate the differences that make each of us unique. Our culture is built on mutual respect recognizing that our variety of backgrounds experiences and perspectives leads to better solutions which fosters our continued success for our employee-owners and clients.

In accordance with ESAs duty and responsibility to provide and maintain a safe workplace that is free of known hazards and to minimize the exposure to potential hazards any employee who works from an ESA office or conducts any other in-person ESA work-related activity is required to submit their proof of vaccination status or have received an approved exemption and accommodation in states which this applies.

If you are an applicant with a disability that requires a reasonable accommodation to complete any part of the application process or are limited in the abilityor unable to usethe online application system and need an alternative method for applying you may contact our Human Resources Department via email:for assistance.

Please include the following in your message so we can promptly address your request:

• Full name
• The best method to contact you (phone number and/or email address)
• Title of Job Position Applied
• Description of your accommodation request

ESA is an Equal Opportunity Employer committed to a diverse and inclusive work environment. (EOEM/V/F/D)