---
title: 'Lead Field Operator – Wells, Drilling & Pumping at Terranova'
canonical: 'https://feeny.ai/job/lead-field-operator-wells-drilling-pumping-terranova-berkeley-mpb1n22he5zj'
type: 'job'
last_seen: '2026-10-26'
---

# Lead Field Operator – Wells, Drilling & Pumping at Terranova

- **Company:** Terranova
- **Location:** Berkeley, CA
- **Employment:** full-time
- **Work type:** onsite
- **Posted:** 2026-09-21
- **Last confirmed live:** 2026-10-26
- **Apply:** https://jobs.ashbyhq.com/terranova/1a35d731-d89a-4e44-b284-e45a734f121b

## Job description

## About Terranova

Terranova builds robotic systems that lift land, restore wetlands, and protect critical infrastructure from flooding and sea-level rise. We are hiring an experienced operator to run our equipment safely and reliably at active job sites. This is a hands-on field position based in Berkeley, California, with regular travel to deployment sites.

## The Role

This is not an office, engineering, or equipment-design position. Most of your work will involve operating, transporting, setting up, maintaining, and repairing equipment in the field. We are specifically looking for a well-rounded oilfield operator with experience across drilling, well construction, workover, cementing, injection, or pressure-pumping operations. You should understand how an entire wellsite operates rather than having experience limited to one narrow specialty. Experience progressing through multiple rig or well-service roles—such as floorhand, motorhand, derrickhand, driller, toolpusher, workover operator, or well-service operator—is strongly preferred. You should be comfortable working outdoors, getting dirty, performing physical work, and troubleshooting equipment when something breaks. Practical field experience is more important than a college degree.

## Responsibilities

- Operate Terranova’s drilling, pumping, injection, robotic, and support equipment
- Support borehole drilling, stabilization, injection, and pressure-pumping operations
- Monitor pressure, flow, equipment performance, and changing subsurface conditions
- Recognize and respond to borehole instability, lost circulation, pressure changes, equipment failures, and other field issues
- Rig up, inspect, operate, and break down pumps, hoses, valves, fittings, generators, and pressurized systems
- Load, secure, transport, stage, and unload equipment, tools, parts, and materials
- Operate or support skid steers, loaders, forklifts, trailers, pumps, and similar machinery
- Perform equipment inspections, preventive maintenance, troubleshooting, and field repairs
- Diagnose mechanical, hydraulic, electrical, and controls-related failures
- Maintain safe, clean, and organized job sites, vehicles, trailers, and equipment
- Document operating conditions, equipment issues, repairs, and lessons learned
- Provide practical field feedback to improve Terranova’s equipment and procedures

Required Experience

- At least three years of hands-on oilfield, drilling, well-service, workover, cementing, completion, injection, or pressure-pumping experience
- Experience across multiple parts of wellsite operations rather than one narrow specialty
- Working knowledge of drilling fluids, borehole stability, lost circulation, casing, cementing, pumps, pressure lines, valves, and hydraulics
- Experience rigging up and breaking down field equipment
- Experience operating, maintaining, troubleshooting, and repairing physical equipment
- Strong mechanical aptitude and practical field judgment
- Ability to safely use hand tools, power tools, and diagnostic equipment
- Ability to perform physically demanding work outdoors in changing conditions
- Willingness to work weekends, travel, and stay overnight when required
- Valid driver’s license and safe driving record
- U.S. permanent residency

Experience as a driller, toolpusher, workover-rig operator, well-service operator, or senior rig hand with exposure to both drilling and pressure-pumping operations is strongly preferred. A college degree is not required.

Schedule This is a five-day-per-week position, but it is not a Monday–Friday schedule. Workweeks may include weekends, and schedules may change during field deployments. Occasional sixth days, travel, and overnight stays may be required.

## About Terranova

## Company Overview
- **One-liner**: Terranova builds car-sized terraforming robots that inject a wood slurry deep underground to lift land out of flood zones, providing permanent elevation without surface disturbance.
- **Entity Type**: Private (Seed stage)
- **Headquarters**: Berkeley, California, United States
- **Founded**: Not publicly available
- **Founders**: Trip Allen (CEO/Executive Chairman), Laurence Allen (Forward-Deployed CEO)

## Core Business
- Primary industry/industries: Robotics Engineering, Climate Adaptation, Construction Technology
- Target customers: Real estate developers, infrastructure contractors, government agencies, defense organizations, and wetland conservation groups operating in flood-prone regions
- Mission or purpose statement: “To terraform the earth and usher in a new era of resilience and societal abundance” — Laurence Allen, CEO

## Products & Services
- **Terraforming Robot System**: A fleet of three car-sized injection robots and one “mothership” that can lift one acre by one foot per day. The robots inject a wood slurry deep underground to permanently elevate land with minimal surface disturbance.
- **Site Suitability Predictor**: An AI-driven tool that analyzes soil composition and flood risk to determine optimal project locations.
- **AI Injection Campaign Designer**: Machine learning reasoning models that design the precise injection pattern needed to achieve a desired surface topology.

## Market Standing
- **Valuation**: $25.1 million (post-seed round)
- **Key Metric**: $7 million in seed funding (closed three times oversubscribed)
- **Notable Investors/Partners**: Outlander VC (co-lead), Congruent Ventures (co-lead), GoAhead Ventures, Gothams, Ponderosa (Galvanize Climate fund), and angels including Palmer Luckey
- **Growth Signals**: Emerging from stealth in 2025 with a $7M seed round; targeting costs up to an order of magnitude less than levees or seawalls; actively hiring across robotics, embedded systems, and business development roles

## Competitive Advantages
- **Cost advantage**: Targeting costs up to 10x cheaper than traditional levees or seawalls
- **Speed**: Projects completed in 2–8 weeks versus 3–36 months for conventional methods
- **Minimal environmental impact**: Uses waste biomass (wood slurry) as fill; no surface disturbance; minimal ecological disruption compared to surface fill or seawalls
- **Permanent solution**: Elevation is permanent, providing proactive flood protection rather than reactive defense
- **Unique technology moat**: Proprietary combination of heavy robotics, geotechnical engineering, and AI/ML for subsurface injection

## Strategic Focus
- Scaling from prototype to full-scale production of robot systems
- Beginning first commercial elevation projects in flood-prone regions (e.g., San Rafael, CA)
- Growing core engineering and field deployment teams
- Expanding into multiple verticals: real estate development, infrastructure, defense, mining, and wetlands restoration

## Why Work Here
- **Culture**: Mission-driven climate tech startup tackling a massive global problem (flooding costs the U.S. economy over $180B/year)
- **Work model**: In-office, based in Berkeley, CA (HQ) with a secondary office in Miami Beach, FL
- **Team size**: ~22 employees (as of mid-2025); tight-knit, early-stage environment
- **Engineering focus**: Heavy emphasis on robotics, controls, embedded systems, and mechanical engineering — a hardware-heavy startup building physical robots
- **Recent job openings**: Robotics Controls Engineer, Embedded Systems Engineer, Senior Mechanical Engineer, Director of Business Development, and multiple intern positions
- **Growth trajectory**: Early-stage with strong investor backing and clear product-market fit; opportunity to shape the company’s technical direction and culture

## Sources
1. [terranova.inc](https://www.terranova.inc/)
2. [LinkedIn - Terranova](https://www.linkedin.com/company/terranova-inc)
3. [Built In - Terranova Careers](https://builtin.com/company/terranova)
4. [The Robot Report - Seed Funding](https://www.therobotreport.com/terranova-gets-seed-funding-deploy-terraforming-robots/)
5. [Ashby Jobs Page](https://jobs.ashbyhq.com/Terranova)

## Other roles at Terranova

- [Software Engineering Intern](https://feeny.ai/job/software-engineering-intern-terranova-berkeley-86ykdj3chn6h) — Berkeley, CA
- [Embedded Systems Intern](https://feeny.ai/job/embedded-systems-intern-terranova-berkeley-9xhyfdx9g665) — Berkeley, CA
- [Mechanical/Test Engineering Intern](https://feeny.ai/job/mechanical-test-engineering-intern-terranova-berkeley-m8yaxgtmxsy2) — Berkeley, CA
- [Controls/Robotics Intern](https://feeny.ai/job/controls-robotics-intern-terranova-berkeley-jxm04qgs5vck) — Berkeley, CA
- [Field Equipment Operator](https://feeny.ai/job/field-equipment-operator-terranova-berkeley-q7a8f9f0nx69) — Berkeley, CA
- [Mechanical Engineer](https://feeny.ai/job/mechanical-engineer-terranova-berkeley-4m3dv96n0e1v) — Berkeley, CA
- [VP of Ops](https://feeny.ai/job/vp-of-ops-terranova-berkeley-8mzfk1d3knkn) — Berkeley, CA
- [Embedded Systems Engineer](https://feeny.ai/job/embedded-systems-engineer-terranova-berkeley-4qhqhpd8pqxx) — Berkeley, CA
- [General Application](https://feeny.ai/job/general-application-terranova-berkeley-q1037bmrb2ny) — Berkeley, CA
- [Director of Business Development](https://feeny.ai/job/director-of-business-development-terranova-berkeley-zeyd791y32z2) — Berkeley, CA