Surface Land Jobs (NOW HIRING)

Compensation
$127.03/hr
No allowances

Location
Houston Campus
Approximately 10% travel to Midland Basin field locations

Schedule
Monday–Friday, 8:00 a.m.–5:00 p.m.

Target Start Date
ASAP

Tentative End Date
One year from start date

The Project Development Engineer serves as the front-end integrator for greenfield and brownfield upstream unconventional well locations, facilities, and infrastructure. This position translates business objectives, operational requirements, and technical inputs into clear, aligned, execution-ready project scopes.

The role coordinates technical development, regulatory and permitting requirements, cost and schedule considerations, operational risks, and stakeholder expectations to establish a complete project basis before execution. This individual builds trusted partnerships across stakeholder groups and helps shape projects that support safe, efficient, capital-conscious, and value-focused execution.

Front-End Project Development and Scope Definition

• Lead early planning and scope development for well pads, tank batteries, well pad facilities, flowlines, gathering systems, water infrastructure, access roads, power, compression, and associated upstream infrastructure.
• Progress projects from initial concept through design-basis and execution readiness.
• Translate business objectives, operational needs, subsurface plans, and technical inputs into clear, complete, and execution-ready scopes.
• Develop and coordinate front-end engineering and design activities, feasibility assessments, project alternatives, and technical-basis documentation.
• Support business-unit development-planning milestones, including Decision Quality Assurance Reviews/Roadmaps and Drill Unit Reviews.
• Ensure projects transition smoothly from front-end development into detailed engineering, construction, commissioning, startup, and operations.

Stakeholder Integration

• Serve as the front-end integrator across the Business Unit, Global Operations, Wells/Drilling and Completions, Project Execution, Central Engineering, Surface Land, Regulatory, Project Controls, Procurement, and Supply Chain teams.
• Coordinate technical and operational interfaces between Wells, surface facilities, production operations, infrastructure, and project-execution teams.
• Establish stakeholder alignment early to reduce rework, clarify responsibilities and handoffs, and improve decision quality.
• Facilitate multidisciplinary reviews and communicate technical information, risks, assumptions, and recommendations to both technical and nontechnical stakeholders.
• Frame alternatives and tradeoffs when scope, schedule, cost, risk, constructability, regulatory requirements, and stakeholder expectations compete.

Value Creation and Decision Quality

• Develop and evaluate facility and infrastructure alternatives supporting capital-efficient, value-focused development scenarios.
• Prepare technical recommendations that help inform subsurface, development, sequencing, and investment decisions.
• Support preparation and evaluation of project cost estimates, AFEs, schedules, equipment requirements, and execution strategies.
• Monitor project assumptions, costs, schedule risks, and potential scope changes during front-end development.
• Identify opportunities to reduce capital spending, operating costs, execution risks, downtime, and unnecessary project complexity.
• Partner with business, reservoir, operations, engineering, and project-controls personnel to support informed scoping and investment decisions.

Technical Basis, Risk Management, and Execution Readiness

• Develop and steward pre-Gate 3 technical bases, project layouts, site requirements, permitting strategies, planning assumptions, and alignment with standard designs.
• Coordinate early input regarding regulatory requirements, surface land, environmental constraints, permitting, constructability, equipment demand, inventory forecasting, and execution planning.
• Identify technical complexity, operational interfaces, project risks, and potential execution constraints during the planning phase.
• Support risk assessments, constructability reviews, design reviews, readiness reviews, and other decision-quality activities.
• Develop or support project workflows, stage-gate deliverables, QA/QC processes, and documentation requirements.
• Coordinate commissioning, startup, operational-readiness, and SIMOPS considerations during front-end planning.
• Provide the coordination and technical stewardship needed for an effective project handoff into execution.
• Confirm that approved scope, technical requirements, assumptions, risks, costs, schedules, and stakeholder commitments are clearly documented before handoff.

Regulatory and Permitting Coordination

• Support development and implementation of permitting strategies for upstream well locations, production facilities, flowlines, gathering infrastructure, access, and related project components.
• Coordinate with regulatory, environmental, surface land, engineering, and operations personnel to identify requirements and constraints early.
• Track permitting inputs and regulatory commitments that could affect project scope, schedule, cost, or execution sequencing.
• Ensure regulatory and permitting considerations are incorporated into the project basis and execution plan.

Continuous Improvement and Team Effectiveness

• Contribute to a collaborative team culture centered on clarity, ownership, constructive challenge, and trusted partnerships.
• Identify process gaps, interface issues, recurring execution problems, and sources of rework within the front-end development process.
• Capture and communicate lessons learned from project development, construction, commissioning, startup, and operations.
• Support development of tools, workflows, templates, standards, and quality-control practices that improve scope quality, consistency, and execution readiness.
• Promote continuous improvement through benchmarking, performance reviews, and comparison of planned results against actual project outcomes.
• Provide technical guidance, coaching, and knowledge sharing to less-experienced team members when needed.

• Subsurface/Development Planning: Development concepts, priorities, well sequencing, resource plans, economics, and infrastructure requirements
• Global Operations: Facility requirements, operational constraints, operability, maintainability, commissioning, startup, and maintenance considerations
• Surface Land/Regulatory: Site planning, access, constraints, permitting strategy, environmental requirements, and regulatory readiness
• Integrated Operations Planning and Scheduling: Drilling and completions timing, development sequencing, project dependencies, and planning-milestone compliance
• Wells—Drilling and Completions: Well-planning interfaces, development timing, pad and facility coordination, execution sequencing, SIMOPS, and operational risks
• Project Execution: Handoff readiness, constructability, execution planning, commissioning, schedule assumptions, and scope clarity
• Central Engineering: Standard-design verification, technical-basis support, engineering assurance, design reviews, and technical guidance
• Project Controls: Cost estimating, AFE development, schedule development, forecasting, risk analysis, and capital-efficiency support
• Procurement/Supply Chain: Equipment demand, long-lead items, inventory requirements, contracting strategies, and supply planning

• Becomes a trusted front-end integrator across the organization.
• Develops clear, complete, and aligned scopes that reduce downstream rework and improve execution readiness.
• Establishes stakeholder alignment before projects enter execution.
• Identifies permitting, land, technical, constructability, cost, schedule, and operational risks early enough to influence project decisions.
• Improves development decisions through option evaluation, capital efficiency, and value-based tradeoffs.
• Produces effective project handoffs with clearly documented scope, technical basis, risks, assumptions, schedules, costs, and stakeholder commitments.
• Brings clarity to ambiguous problems and moves projects from uncertainty to executable plans.
• Uses lessons learned and performance feedback to improve future project-development workflows and outcomes.

• Bachelor’s degree in engineering or a related technical field is required.
• Previous experience with project development, front-end planning, project execution, or engineering activities is required.
• Experience developing projects through feasibility, concept selection, FEED, design-basis, or stage-gate readiness is strongly preferred.
• Upstream oil and gas experience involving production facilities, well pads, tank batteries, flowlines, gathering systems, or associated infrastructure is preferred.
• Upstream unconventional development experience is strongly preferred.
• Experience supporting greenfield and brownfield projects is preferred.
• Working knowledge of project scope development, cost estimating, AFE preparation, scheduling, risk identification, and execution planning.
• Experience coordinating regulatory, permitting, surface land, constructability, commissioning, startup, or operational-readiness requirements is preferred.
• Ability to evaluate project alternatives and clearly communicate scope, cost, schedule, technical, operational, and execution-risk tradeoffs.
• Strong communication, stakeholder-management, and multidisciplinary coordination skills.
• Strong analytical, problem-solving, documentation, and technical-writing abilities.
• Experience with QA/QC workflows, readiness reviews, lessons learned, and continuous-improvement processes is preferred.
• Proficiency with Microsoft Office applications.
• Experience with engineering, planning, project-controls, visualization, or well-management software is beneficial.

Interview Process
30-minute Zoom meet-and-greet.