Environmental and Safety Specialist

SUMMARY

About Ketjen

Ketjen Corporation is a provider of advanced catalyst solutions to leading producers in the petrochemical, refining, and specialty chemicals industries. Our company is driven by a strong set of core values: curiosity, care, collaboration, humility, accountability, and integrity. These values guide our decisions, shape our culture, and define how we work together to deliver exceptional value to our customers and communities. 

About the RoleThe Environmental & Safety Specialist serves as Ketjen’s corporate environmental lead and Dangerous Goods subject matter expert, supporting logistics and transportation safety while driving continuous improvement in the company’s overall HSE systems and performance. This role partners closely with corporate and site-based HSE teams to establish standards, strengthen regulatory compliance, and improve environmental and safety outcomes across Ketjen’s operations.

This role reports directly to the Ketjen Safety Improvement Manager and is based in Houston, TX. The ideal candidate brings deep environmental and safety expertise, strong regulatory knowledge, and a proactive, data-driven mindset aligned with Ketjen’s values-driven culture.

KEY RESPONSIBILITIES

Environmental Performance & Reporting

• Deliver corporate-level reporting for emissions, waste generation, and environmental performance metrics.
• Evaluate, classify, and support investigation of environmental incidents, including severity assessment and corrective actions.
• Maintain awareness of current and emerging environmental regulations; assess applicability and escalate regulatory impacts to senior stakeholders.
• Advise leadership on environmental compliance pathways, permit strategies, and environmental reserve considerations.
• Act as SME and advanced user for environmental and HSE software systems.

Dangerous Goods & Transportation Safety

• Serve as Dangerous Goods expert for transportation and logistics, ensuring safe, compliant movement of materials and effective release-mitigation readiness.
• Oversee Ketjen’s transportation safety program and provide technical guidance across global operations

Continuous Improvement and Corporate Support

• Lead environmental audits of site programs and provide oversight for audit responses, corrective actions, and agency findings.
• Support site teams with incident investigations, regulatory responses, and remediation planning.
• Develop an effective program for data mining of environmental incidents and observations to identify KPIs and continuous improvement projects
• Propose and lead improvement initiatives to close environmental performance gaps while optimizing cost, efficiency, and resource effectiveness.
• Support Commercial teams with HSE responses to customer questionnaires and sustainability data requests
• Manage technical content of corporate HSE documentation and partner on development of training materials

QUALIFICATIONS

Required Qualifications

• Minimum 7 years of relevant experience in the chemical or related manufacturing industry 

• Bachelor’s (or Master’s) degree in Occupational Safety, Environmental Sciences, Engineering, or related HSE discipline; or equivalent combination of technical education and Environmental/Safety program management experience (minimum 3 years)

• Familiarity with Dangerous Goods standards and global logistics/transport regulations
• Willingness to expand areas of expertise based on organizational need
• Strong alignment with Ketjen’s core values: curiosity, care, collaboration, humility, accountability, and integrity 

Preferred Qualifications

• Minimum 10 years of experience in the chemical or related manufacturing industry

• Experience with Environmental regulations across the U.S., Texas, and Europe
• Demonstrated global and multi-production-site environmental management experience
• Advanced competency in HSE systems, reporting tools, and analytics