RERenewable Energy Engineer
RE
Career

Renewable Energy Engineer

By the numbers
Typical pay
$122,930 / yr
Education to start
Bachelor's degree
Future demand
+2.1% by 2034
People in this job
154K
Figures shown for ·closest of 3 O*NET occupations
The work
A day, hour by hour
08:00
Data pull & triage

Pull overnight output data from the solar farm; flag any turbines running below target.

08:45
Project standup

Sync with PM and contractors. Unblock permitting hold on the wind site.

09:15
Simulation run

Feed updated wind-speed data into WindPRO; see if the yield forecast still holds.

11:00
Site-viability call

Decide: is this client's rooftop solar resource strong enough to bother building?

13:00
Client presentation

Walk investors through battery-sizing tradeoffs — reliability vs. cost, in plain terms.

14:30
Troubleshoot underperformer

One turbine is 12% below target. Dig into SCADA logs to find the culprit.

15:45
Tech research block

Compare two new lithium-iron-phosphate battery suppliers against current spec.

16:45
Permit review

Check environmental compliance docs before tomorrow's grid-interconnection submission.

Things you do
  • Design solar, wind, or hydro systems that actually generate clean power.
  • Run computer simulations to predict how much energy a system will produce.
  • Visit sites to assess whether wind, sun, or water conditions are strong enough.
  • Troubleshoot why a solar farm or wind turbine is underperforming its targets.
  • Navigate permits and environmental rules before breaking ground on a project.
Decisions you’ll make
  • Is this site's wind or solar resource strong enough to make the project worth building?
  • Should I oversize the battery storage for reliability, or keep costs down for the client?
  • Do I flag this underperforming turbine now, or wait for more data before sounding the alarm?
  • Is the grid here stable enough to handle this much intermittent power, or do I need to redesign?
  • Should I push back on the project timeline, or find a way to make it work as-is?
Education Pathways · how you get there
79 in 100 went the college route · 21 in 100 found another way in None, typically
Education mapped from O*NET:
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