Senior Data Scientist

Uplight is creating a new category of energy. We make software that manages energy resources in homes and businesses—including things like smart thermostats, electric vehicles, solar panels, storage batteries, heat pumps, and even people’s behavior—to generate, shift, or save energy to balance the grid, making it more efficient and reliable. This creates clean energy capacity that can be used by the power grid instead of burning more fossil fuels. Our solutions accelerate the transition to clean energy and save money for energy customers.We are seeking a highly skilled Data Scientist with a focus on Optimization and Software Engineering to join our Predictive Controls team. Our team is responsible for optimizing and dispatching flexible energy resources to participate in a variety of grid and market services, including virtual power plants (VPPs), wholesale energy arbitrage, ancillary services, demand response, and grid support.The ideal candidate brings a deep understanding of electricity markets, strong analytical and modeling capabilities, and robust software engineering skills to deploy and maintain optimization logic in a production environment. You will work at the intersection of energy systems, mathematical optimization, and software development, collaborating closely with both internal teams and external customers.How you will make an impact:Domain Knowledge & Modeling

• Develop and maintain models of distributed energy resources (DERs) and flexible energy assets for operational and financial optimization.
• Apply knowledge of electricity markets and grid services to build realistic and effective dispatch strategies.
• Understand and interpret regulatory frameworks and market mechanisms (e.g., frequency regulation, capacity markets, bidding logic).

Optimization & Modeling

• Build, test, and deploy optimization models using tools like Pyomo, AMPL, or similar.
• Use solvers such as Gurobi, CPLEX, or open-source alternatives for solving large-scale scheduling and dispatch problems.
• Design models that balance performance, scalability, and interpretability.

Software Engineering

• Develop production-grade software, primarily in Python, with strong attention to clean code, modularity, and performance.
• Work with version control (Git), CI/CD tools, and containerization (Docker/Kubernetes) for robust development workflows.
• Contribute to codebase architecture, testing frameworks, and deployment pipelines.

Production Support & Reliability

• Monitor, debug, and improve live optimization systems and supporting data pipelines.
• Troubleshoot complex issues across modeling, data quality, and infrastructure layers.
• Use observability tools (e.g., logging, metrics, alerting) to maintain system reliability.

Customer-Facing Solution Engineering

• Interpret and implement non-standard customer requirements, including unique asset behaviors or contractual obligations.
• Customize optimization logic and integrate customer-specific configurations.
• Communicate technical concepts clearly to non-technical stakeholders and customers.

Testing & Quality Assurance

• Design integration tests that span multiple platform components (e.g., configurator + optimizer + forecast + dispatch).
• Implement regression testing to safeguard against unintended model changes.
• Simulate edge cases and real-world scenarios to validate robustness and performance.

What you bring to Uplight:

• Proven experience in mathematical optimization (e.g., LP, MILP), especially in energy systems or similar domains.
• Proficient in programming language (e.g., Python) with production-level software engineering experience.
• Strong understanding of electricity markets, DERs, and VPP operation.
• Familiarity with optimization frameworks (e.g., Pyomo, AMPL) and solvers (e.g., Gurobi, CPLEX).
• Experience with CI/CD, Docker, version control, and observability practices.
• Ability to reason about trade-offs between model fidelity, performance, and business value.

Bonus points:

• Experience working with flexible energy assets (e.g., batteries, HVAC, EVs).
• Exposure to real-time systems or critical infrastructure software.