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Location: Aberdeen, Scotland. Hybrid initially (UK preferred)

Type: Full time

Reports to: Head of Nuclear Systems

Clearance: Ability to obtain UK national security clearances.

About Us:

Orkora is developing a new class of offshore nuclear power station, to be stationed in international waters and connected to shore via HVDC subsea cables. We aim to deliver scalable baseload power with unmatched environment, carbon, and political footprint efficiency.

We are assembling a world-class engineering team to prototype and validate the key subsystems of our power platform. The Neutronics Engineer will play a central role developing and validating the reactor's core physics, fuel cycle, and safety characteristics.

Role Overview:

You will be responsible for modelling and optimizing the heat transport, rheology, fluidic circulation, and thermal management strategies of Orkora’s proprietary reactor system. You’ll work closely with core designers, structural engineers, and systems integrators to ensure safe, stable, and efficient thermal performance across a multi-decade reactor lifecycle.

Your work will define both steady-state operating / end of life conditions and transient response during off-normal or passive shutdown scenarios supporting licensing, safety cases, and system validation.

Key Responsibilities:

Primary System Modelling: Simulate thermal transport from fuel to coolant to vessel using coupled neutronics and CFD or system codes. Evaluate temperature profiles, thermal gradients, pressure drops, and phase margins.

Coolant Dynamics: Analyse flow behaviour of primary coolant under natural circulation and forced circulation scenarios. Understand buoyancy-driven flow, stratification, flow reversal risks, and coolant phase change margins.

Transient Response: Model dynamic responses to loss-of-load, shutdown, overcooling, and decay heat conditions. Quantify system thermal inertia and safety margins during accident scenarios.

Heat Exchanger Design: Design and model intermediate heat exchangers and power fluid interfaces. Evaluate heat exchanger fouling, thermal cycling, and mechanical integration with reactor and balance-of-plant.

Thermal Stresses and Fatigue: Work with materials and mechanical teams to evaluate thermal stresses, creep fatigue, and long-cycle thermal transients across vessel, internals, and fuel assemblies.

Safety and Licensing Support: Contribute to thermal-hydraulic sections of the safety case and licensing documentation. Quantify decay heat removal capacity, lead freezing avoidance, and vessel protection strategies.

Toolchain and V&V: Build a coherent toolchain using system-level and CFD codes (e.g., RELAP, SAM, ANSYS CFX, OpenFOAM). Validate models against literature, test loops, and surrogate experimental data.

Power Fluid and BOP Interfaces: Support integration of thermal models with secondary-side turbine cycle, including thermal efficiency mapping, HX interface parameters, and start-up/shutdown protocols.

Design Feedback Loop: Collaborate closely with neutronics, fuel, structural, and marine teams to optimize the overall system architecture, physical layout, and lifecycle maintainability.

Qualifications:

Education: MSc or PhD in Nuclear Engineering, Mechanical Engineering, Thermal Sciences, or equivalent.

Experience: 3+ years in reactor thermal-hydraulics, bonus if experience with fast reactors.

Software Proficiency: Experience with RELAP, SAM, TRACE, or OpenFOAM. Bonus: ANSYS CFX, STAR-CCM+, COMSOL, or NPHASE. Familiarity with multi-physics coupling a strong advantage.

Reactor Knowledge: Understanding of LFR, SFR, or MSR systems and their unique thermal-hydraulic challenges. Knowledge of some specific coolant fluids advantageous.

Physical Intuition: Strong grasp of natural and driven flows, heat exchanger design, and non-linear feedback effects in passive safety systems.

Regulatory Awareness: Experience supporting safety case submissions for novel reactor systems (ONR, NRC, ASME, IAEA) preferred.

Soft Skills: Structured thinker, cross-disciplinary collaborator, comfortable with uncertainty and model iteration

Preferred (Bonus)

• Experience with natural circulation system design and analysis
• Familiarity with latent heat / phase change modelling, (freezing / boiling).
• Prior design or test work on high-temperature heat exchangers
• Exposure to sCO₂ power cycle integration, HX optimization, or Brayton cycle dynamics
• Understanding of licensing safety limits (DNBR, CHF, max clad T, etc.) in advanced reactors
• Contribution to experimental test loop design, commissioning, or data interpretation

What we offer:

Career defining opportunity to develop and build a first of a kind nuclear platform.

Work on high impact, civilisation scale problems.

Collaborate with a compact, world-class, multidisciplinary team (Skunkworks model).

Competitive salary + equity.

Flexible working hours, meaningful autonomy, and a clear long term mission. You are responsible for delivering your mission objectives.

Support for clearance, publication and professional development.

Participation in a high performance team.

Seniority level

• Seniority level

  Mid-Senior level

Employment type

• Employment type

  Full-time

Job function

• Job function

  Engineering and Information Technology

• Industries

  Nuclear Electric Power Generation

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