Principal Civils Engineer in Abingdon, Oxfordshire

• Location: West Burton / Culham (Abingdon) with programme travel.

• Type: Full-time (Flexible working options available)

• Security Clearance: UK BPSS Vetting Required.

• Client / Project: Major UK Infrastructure & Construction Group | Supporting STEP Fusion Programme (ILIOS Partner)

• Sponsorship: Candidates must have existing right to work in the UK (sponsorship not available)

Our client is a leading UK infrastructure and construction group operating as the primary Construction Partner (ILIOS) for the UK's world-leading Spherical Tokamak for Energy Production (STEP) fusion programme. Embedded within the central project leadership, their technical teams bring high-integrity engineering governance, design authority oversight, and major infrastructure delivery capabilities to world-first clean energy and nuclear-adjacent developments.

Fully embedded within the STEP Design Authority team, the Principal Civils Engineer acts as a technical authority, applying authoritative civil and structural engineering judgement to define, integrate, and assure the design of buildings, civil structures, groundworks, and site-wide infrastructure for the prototype fusion power plant.

• Design Vision & Governance: Define and maintain the civil plant design vision, engineering principles, and controlled civil design basis. Establish proportionate civil/structural engineering governance and technical review arrangements.

• Technical Authority & Review: Act as the technical authority for reviewing and accepting civil and structural design outputs, exercising independent engineering judgement on complex design baselines.

• Systems Integration: Guarantee design integrity and seamless interface integration between civil structures, buildings, groundworks, fusion plant systems, and external utilities.

• Safety Case & Regulatory Support: Support safety case development, regulatory engagement, and construction readiness by providing authoritative advice on civil/structural safety and compliance.

• Education & Professional Status: Degree in Civil or Structural Engineering (or closely related discipline) and Chartered Engineer (CEng) status with a recognized professional institution (e.g., MICE / MIStructE).

• Technical Authority Experience: Proven track record acting as a Technical Authority, Design Authority Specialist, Intelligent-Client Engineer, or Independent Assessor in complex, highly regulated, or safety-critical sectors.

• Complex Design Governance: Experience managing technical verification, validation, and review processes on complex, multi-disciplinary infrastructure projects with evolving design baselines.

• Interpersonal Skills: Strong systems-integration capability and ability to make robust, defensible engineering decisions under uncertainty.