Operations & Maintenance Consultant

Operations & Maintenance Consultant

Dallas / Houston

Baker & O’Brien is seeking candidates for an Operations and Maintenance Consultant role. This role will support both advisory and dispute resolution work related to plant operations and maintenance, including industry best practices, standard-of-care, and incident investigations. The ideal candidate has extensive experience in operations and maintenance within petrochemical, refining, natural gas, LNG, and/or power plants and has held operations and/or maintenance management positions.

Preferred Work Experience

Demonstrated experience in daily plant operations, including chemical processing technology, operator training, procedure use, process alarm management, production planning, and troubleshooting.

Demonstrated experience in daily plant maintenance, including planning and scheduling, predictive/preventative maintenance (PPM) techniques, equipment repair techniques, technical guidance, mechanical integrity, spare parts, and contractor/vendor selection and qualification.

Active participation in maintenance turnaround activities from scoping, planning, contractor management, and execution.

Firsthand understanding of OSHA safe work practices (e.g., Lockout/Tagout [LOTO], hot work, fall protection, confined space entry, etc.) and process safety management (e.g., Hazard and Operability Studies [HAZOPs], Layers of Protection Analysis [LOPA], and Safety Instrumented Systems) or international equivalents.

Design, commissioning, and start-up experience with expansion projects and/or new builds.

Recognized facilitator of Root Cause Analyses (RCAs) for safety incidents and equipment failures.

Preferred Equipment Experience

Working knowledge of typical plant equipment, including pressure vessels, columns/towers, tanks, furnaces, relief devices, heat exchangers, pumps, compressors, agitators, valves, piping, switchgear, motor control centers (MCCs), and distributed control systems (DCSs).

Relied upon to diagnose and resolve process and/or equipment issues.

Detailed experience in the operation and/or maintenance of cracker furnaces, gas/steam turbines, reciprocating compressors, centrifugal compressors, power generation, and fired equipment is a plus.

Qualifications

A minimum of a bachelor’s degree in mechanical or chemical engineering. Other engineering degrees considered with consummate plant experience.

A minimum of 15 years as a plant engineer (operations, maintenance, and/or reliability), including at least five years managing and overseeing similar functions.

Open and responsive to candid feedback.

The ability to explain complex technical matters in simple-to-understand terms.

Proven writing skills.

Environmental, Safey, and Health role experience is a plus.