[Hiring] Research Environmental Scientist @Research Triangle Institute

Role Description

Are you passionate about water resources and environmental science? RTI’s Water, Agriculture, Natural Resources, and Energy Solutions (WARES) Group is seeking a motivated Research Environmental Scientist to join our hydromet and flood risk team. We develop innovative tools and analytical methods that support hydropower owners, dam safety programs, and the broader water resources community.

As part of the team, you will contribute to a broad range of meteorological frequency analyses and extreme storm analyses. Candidates should be able to demonstrate experience or exposure in several of the areas listed below (not all are required).

What You'll Do

• Support project teams requiring meteorological expertise to support hydrologic hazards, flood forecasting, and other analyses.
• Work daily using scripts, tools, and techniques to efficiently prepare and analyze meteorological data including addressing climate change impacts using GCM data.
• Support project management and grow project portfolios.

Essential Duties:

• Collaborate with the Hydromet team to implement and enhance RTI’s hydrometeorological analysis tools.
• Perform data processing, quality control, and automation using scripts and tools.
• Collect, process, quality control, and statistically analyze large datasets of meteorological information.
• Develop code to improve existing hydrometeorological analysis tools and link to other existing hydrologic modeling or forecasting tools.
• Contribute to precipitation frequency and probable maximum precipitation analyses in support of dam safety projects.
• Lead small projects or task orders of moderate complexity.
• Contribute to proposal development.
• Share work internally and externally through presentations and conference papers.
• Make informed decisions based on data, best practices, and team input.
• Support business development by identifying opportunities to expand or enhance existing projects and developing research ideas or white papers.

Qualifications

• Bachelor’s degree and 8 years of relevant experience, master’s degree and 6 years of relevant experience, or a PhD and 1 year of relevant experience, or an equivalent combination of education and experience.
• Relevant fields include Meteorology, Atmospheric Science, Hydrology, Climate Studies, or a related discipline.

Requirements

• Experience in statistical analysis of hydrometeorological time series, precipitation frequency, and probable maximum precipitation.
• Collection, QA/QC, and interpretation of hydrometeorological data.
• Technical documentation and report writing.
• Experience working with meteorological GIS datasets.
• Proficiency with open-source programming languages (Python, R, C#, VB.NET) for data management, transformation, QC, and statistical analysis.
• Basic geospatial processing and mapping using ArcGIS or QGIS.
• Proficiency with Microsoft Excel and familiarity with relational databases (SQL).
• Legally authorized to work in the United States and should not require, now or in the future, sponsorship for employment visa status.

Preferred Qualifications

• Experience with GCM datasets.
• Experience with extreme storm analyses.
• Familiarity with probabilistic or stochastic modeling concepts.

Benefits

• Competitive base salary.
• Generous paid time off policy.
• Merit-based annual increases.
• Bonus opportunities and a robust recognition program.
• Competitive range of insurance plans (including health, dental, life, and short-term and long-term disability).
• Access to a retirement savings program such as a 401(k) plan.
• Paid parental leave for all parents.
• Financial assistance with adoption expenses or infertility treatments.
• Financial reimbursement for education and developmental opportunities.
• Employee assistance program.
• Numerous other offerings to support a healthy work-life balance.

Hiring Salary Range

$94,000 - $116,000