Operations Director

BW Elara builds, owns and operates floating desalination units - complete seawater reverse osmosis plants on barges, delivered to a customer's coastline and producing water in months rather than years. This role owns the plant: what it is designed to achieve, whether it can achieve it, and how it performs once it is in service. The engineering disciplines report to this role, as do the Barge Managers running the units in service.

With the Project Delivery Director, it is one of the two roles through which the Managing Director runs the company. The Project Delivery Director owns scope, cost, schedule and contracts; the Operations Director owns the technical standard and whether the plant performs. These are client-owned assets, so that judgement rests with BW Elara rather than being a contractor's to propose.

Responsibilities

• Approve the specification and design basis for each new unit, product water quantity and quality, design feedwater envelope, recovery, specific energy consumption and availability, before any package is awarded.

• Hold technical acceptance authority across design, fabrication, integration and commissioning: approve design-basis changes and technical deviations before they are accepted contractually.

• Lead and build the engineering team, assigning engineers to units and allocating their capacity across the portfolio.

• Responsibility with the project delivery manager for the delivery of the barge in the long term.

• Own integrated unit performance against the design basis, accept the performance test and site acceptance, and take each unit into operation.

• Run the operating fleet through the Barge Managers.

• Hold the class and flag relationship as registered owner, together with the technical manager.

• Handle escalation and contract matters on the customer relationship for units in service.

• Build the operations organization ahead of the fleet: define the roles, standards and procedures the next units will require, and recruit to them.

Essential

• 15+ years in water operations, including accountability for the delivery of a project and the performance of plants in service (O&M) rather than only their delivery.

• Operating under long-term water supply or offtake contracts with utilities, governments or industrial customers.

• A track record across the full lifecycle: setting a design basis, holding it through build and

commissioning, and answering for whether the plant met it in service.

• Experience leading multidisciplinary engineering teams and holding technical authority over their

output.

• Demonstrable history of managing operating budgets and operating cost, and of improving plant

availability and performance against contractual obligations.

• Credibility as the technical decision-maker: able to approve or reject a design change, a deviation

or a performance test result, and to hold that position with contractors and suppliers.

• Experience building and recruiting a team and writing the standards and procedures it works to.

• Degree in chemical, process, mechanical or a related engineering discipline.

• Willingness to travel to yards and operating units worldwide.

Advantageous

• Seawater desalination experience, particularly large-scale SWRO.

• Client-side or asset-owner experience rather than contractor or EPC-side.

• Floating, barge-based or other marine assets, including classification society and flag state matters as registered owner.

• Having built an operations function from a small base or scaled one with a growing fleet.

If this role is relevant or of interest to you, do reach out with your CV to [email protected], only shortlisted applicants will be contacted due to the high volume of applications.