Process Safety Engineer
US$200,000 – US$250,000 / yr base salary
Posted 7 Oct 2026
BranchFactor Summary
The original posting with the fluff stripped out
- Expected experience
- 7–10 yrs
- Management level
- Individual contributor
- Employment
- On-Site
- Contract
- Full-time
- Visa sponsorship
- Offered
| Base salary | US$200,000 – US$250,000 / yr |
|---|
CertificationsAssociate Safety Professional (ASP), Certified Industrial Hygienist (CIH)
About Periodic Labs
We’re an AI and physical sciences company building state-of-the-art models to accelerate breakthroughs across materials, energy, and beyond. Backed by world-class investors and growing rapidly, we operate at the pace the frontier requires. Our team brings deep expertise, genuine ownership, and an insatiable drive to push the boundaries of what’s scientifically possible.
About the Role
Periodic Labs is building an AI that can simulate science and verify its own predictions — training on the full scientific method. Central to that mission is a high-throughput experimental materials science lab that handles hazardous chemistries, high-pressure and high-temperature processes, air-sensitive synthesis, toxic gas exposure risks, and an expanding suite of thin-film deposition tools including PVD and PLD. The complexity of what we run overnight and autonomously increases every month.
We believe EHS is integral to this ambition, not a compliance function bolted on after the fact, but a core design discipline that makes autonomous science possible. This role focuses on operational safety: making sure every new process, tool, and autonomous workflow is hazard-reviewed, safe to start up, and safe to run around the clock. You will also help train our AI to reason about risk during experimental planning and execution.
What You’ll Do
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Lead and document HAZOPs, PHA/FMEA, and risk assessments for new processes and lab systems, including toxic and pyrophoric material, high-pressure operations, glovebox workflows, and thin-film deposition platforms.
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Establish operational readiness and laboratory reliability systems for autonomous operations, including pre-startup safety reviews (PSSR), management of change (MOC), commissioning validation, alarm rationalization, startup/shutdown procedures, and critical equipment inspection programs.
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Partner with automation and controls teams to implement machine safeguarding, fail-safes, interlocks, robotics safety controls, functional safety validation, safety PLC reviews, and automated motion hazard assessments for autonomous experimental systems.
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Develop and maintain EHS standards, specifications, procedures, and governance systems that can scale across multiple facilities.
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Collaborate with ML/AI engineers on training an LLM to reason through process hazards, risk assessments, and safety constraints during experimental planning and autonomous execution — making EHS a first-class input to our AI’s decision-making.
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Provide technical expertise in high-throughput R&D with a strong focus on chemical safety, including the thin-film lab's specialty gas delivery, vacuum, and RF/high-voltage systems. .