Junior Developer Part Time

UK Power Networks (Operations) Ltd
Junior Developer

Reference Number – 78315

This Junior Developer will report to the Data Scientist and will work within the DSO directorate based in our London office. You will be a permanent employee.

You will attract a salary of 25,000 – 40,000 (Depending on experience and qualifications ) and a bonus of 7.5%. This role can also offer blended working after probationary period (6 months) – 3 days in the office and 2 remote

Close Date:.02/02/2024

We also provide the following additional benefits

• Annual Leave
• Personal Pension Plan – Personal contribution rates of 4% or 5% (UK Power Networks will make a corresponding contribution of 8% or 10%)
• Tenancy Loan Deposit scheme
• Tax efficient benefits: cycle to work scheme
• Season ticket loan
• Occupational Health support
• Switched On – scheme providing discount on hundreds of retailers products.
• Discounted access to sports and social clubs
• Employee Assistance Programme.

CONTEXT:

UK Power Networks’ Distribution System Operator is at the heart of enabling low carbon technology like electric vehicles (EVs), heat pumps and renewable energy generation. You’ll work with some of the country’s most accomplished low carbon engineers and specialists at the heart of this once in a generation transition to help create the flexible, low carbon energy system of the future.

This is a time of change for the electricity industry transitions to a much more complex, interconnected world of renewable energy, battery storage and electric vehicles. Energy is one of the most important issues in the country right now, and you will receive an incredible insight into the work that goes in to ensuring a safe, reliable, affordable, and green energy supply at in a workplace voted one of the UK’s best big companies to work for.

Your team will ensure sufficient electricity capacity exists across London, the East and Southeast to support the anticipated uptake of low carbon technologies. Come and play your part in enabling the Net Zero energy system of the future within the Data Science & Development Team.

THE TEAM YOU WILL JOIN:

The DSO Data Science and Development Team is a small team comprising the Data Science Manager, 2x Data Scientists and a Data Engineer. We work on a broad range of projects across all core functions of the DSO. At the DSO, we have access to a large amount of electricity network data and our job is to harness that data to derive insights that create benefits for our customers and facilitate the transition to Net Zero.

As an example, we recently designed, built, and deployed a machine learning model to forecast demand and generation across main network assets, such as solar and wind farms. These forecasts were transformed into a frontend tool that our colleagues in the control room could use to improve how we spend money and reduce the impact of power outages on our customers. Forecasting is one of many ongoing workstream with multiple use cases for under development.

The team works across all the DSO teams like a service. We listen to the needs of our colleagues and see if we can build software and tools to enhance their goals. For example, we built a sophisticated curtailment tracker of our renewable energy generators so that the operations team can manage the performance.

Our main responsibilities include making sure we listen to the data needs of our customers and provide that through our Open Data Portal, building software and tools that enable new opportunities for the business, automating tasks that take up a lot of our colleagues’ time, and discovering insights from our existing data.

The successful Junior Developer will participate in all of these responsibilities.

PRINCIPAL ACCOUNTABILITIES:

Working collaboratively within the team, the Junior Developer will:

• Build datasets and publishing them on the Open Data Portal
• Code development of our software and models
• Optimisation and improvements of our existing code
• Troubleshoot and hot fixes of our production code
• Participation in the wider DSO activities and objectives
• Report the progress of your projects to meet your individual targets.

Qualifications:

The Data Science team recognises a broad range of skills that may meet the criteria for this role. As such, we offer training and development opportunities.

This role may be suitable to school leavers that have gained a lot of coding experience throughout school. For this background, we can offer the Digital Academy route to obtain a degree whilst working at UK Power Networks.

Additionally, this role would be suitable for graduates with a degree level qualification in a numerate, computer or engineering discipline.

These are the main skill sets that the Data Science team uses daily that you will require for the role:

• Python (though if you have experience in other languages and believe you would very quickly take to python, you may be suitable)
• Microsoft Office (particularly Excel, Word, and PowerPoint)
• Problem solving
• Work with and understanding data

You will be a junior, entry-level position. We are not expecting background work experience or in-depth knowledge on distribution networks. We do desire a passion for Net Zero, a desire to learn and a willingness to collaborate.

The following skills and coding experience would also be beneficial :

• Git version control and GitHub (we believe you can learn this within the role)
• Front end development (e.g., HTML, JavaScript, CSS)
• Deployment (e.g., Docker containerization)
• Domain knowledge on Net Zero (e.g., electricity networks, renewable energy)
• A GitHub profile tracking your code progress (Link it in your CV!)
• Personal coding projects you’ve delivered.

The salary offered will reflect your background experience.

WHAT YOU WILL LEARN:

UK Power Network’s is a large engineering company with a tremendous breath of disciplines. You will have the autonomy to plot your own development path but here are some of the things you can expect to learn:

• How the electricity network operates
• What does the Net Zero transition look like and how does it affect the electricity network
• Develop code in collaboration with others
• How to develop production-worthy code
• Collaborative teamwork in an Agile framework
• Manage your own projects and deadlines
• The opportunity to gain a degree qualification if applicable.

Health & Safety Responsibilities

Managers and supervisors carry both legal and company responsibilities for ensuring the health and safety of their employees, those under their control and those who might be affected by the work undertaken, i.e. public, visitors and employees of other organisations. This includes briefing individuals working for them and ensuring there is the necessary understanding, competence and application of requirements to work safely and without harming the environment.

Employees will ensure they understand the health and safety risks involved in their work activities and their responsibility to apply the controls needed to manage those risks to acceptable levels. Similarly where work activities can have an adverse impact upon the environment, and where there are legal requirements, employees will understand those impacts and the controls they must ensure are applied.

If in doubt ask!

We are committed to equal employment opportunity regardless of race, colour, ancestry, religion, sex, national origin, sexual orientation, age, citizenship, marital status, disability, gender, gender identity or expression, or veteran status. We are proud to be an equal opportunity workplace.