Fort Worth Is Getting 1,500 Manufacturing, Engineering and Other Jobs From Carrier's New Chiller Plant

Carrier Global Corporation plans to invest over the next three years in a new advanced manufacturing and engineering center in Fort Worth, Texas, and the project will create 1,500 advanced manufacturing, engineering and other jobs. The site at 1501 Distribution Drive in AllianceTexas will make air- and water-cooled commercial chillers, with operations expected to begin in 2027. Carrier posted three jobs based at 1501 Distribution on Oct. 13 and 14, more than a week before the announcement. For Metaintro readers in North Texas, this guide covers what the jobs figure counts, which roles are posted now and what they pay, what the proposed city terms would require, and how factory and engineering pay compares across the metro.

What Exactly Did Carrier Announce for Fort Worth?

The announcement came on Oct. 22, 2026, and the plant will add U.S. capacity for advanced thermal management systems, including air- and water-cooled commercial chillers, for customers in data centers, healthcare, education and industrial markets.

The plant will occupy the more than 1-million-square-foot facility in Hillwood's 1.2 million-square-foot Alliance Westport 12. The site is next to the recently opened Wistron plant, which manufactures components for data centers.

The center will house state-of-the-art engineering labs alongside production, and it is expected to pursue LEED certification under Carrier's sustainability goals. City staff described it as the largest single-facility investment that Carrier has made in their history.

Fort Worth was competing with three states, and at the Aug. 25 work session city staff said the other three states have lower property taxes and the locations are closer to the company's current operations in Florida and North Carolina. Brianna Brown, assistant director of economic development, said Virginia has a property tax rate half that of Fort Worth, while Alabama has a rate that is one-quarter of Fort Worth, and that the incentives would help level the playing field for Fort Worth. By the Oct. 22 announcement, Carrier was considering Fort Worth and a site in Alabama, before choosing Fort Worth for its highly skilled workforce, strong manufacturing base and strategic location.

What Do the Carrier Jobs Count, and When Will They Exist?

That jobs figure covers advanced manufacturing, engineering and other jobs created by the investment. Carrier has not given a split between factory and engineering roles, has not said whether construction jobs are included, and has not said in which year the plant will reach full staffing. The facility would include manufacturing, warehousing, engineering, operations, testing and administrative functions, city staff said. By comparison, Blue Origin has given a timeline for its Texas plant, with a plan to add Hutto jobs over a decade.

The city's incentive terms set a smaller number. These are proposed terms from a presentation the Economic Development Department gave the City Council at its Aug. 25 work session. The council approved tax breaks for the company Sept. 15, though an agreement had not been signed as of Oct. 16. Under the proposed terms, Carrier would have to create at least 495 full-time jobs by the end of 2029 with minimum average salaries of $75,000 and invest $433.8 million between real estate and equipment to receive the incentives.

Most of that proposed capital pledge is for equipment, split as $36 million on real property construction costs and $397.8 million on equipping the plant, due by the end of 2028.

Carrier registered plans with the Texas Department of Licensing and Regulation on Oct. 14 to upgrade the building, with work that could begin Dec. 1 and finish Sept. 1, 2027. TDLR filings are often preliminary and subject to change, and a Carrier spokesperson did not confirm any details in the filing. Planned work includes selective demolition and upgrades to roughly 600,000 square feet of the existing building, including new office space, mezzanines, stairs, an elevator, building envelope improvements and infrastructure to support three manufacturing lines. Lexington, Kentucky-based Gray AES is the design firm on the project.

Carrier would also pledge to spend 30% of construction costs with small businesses under the proposed city terms.

By expanding our U.S. manufacturing and engineering footprint, we are increasing capacity for critical technologies, strengthening supply chain resilience and creating high-quality jobs, Carrier Chairman and CEO David Gitlin said, according to Carrier's announcement.

Which Carrier Jobs in Fort Worth Are Posted Now, and What Do They Pay?

Three roles based at 1501 Distribution, a materials lead and two facilities engineers, plus a finance specialist for a Carrier manufacturing facility, are posted on Carrier's current Fort Worth job search, and none of them is a production line job.

• Materials Lead job listing, posted October 13, 2026, with an annual salary between $143,000.00 - $286,000.00
• Facilities Engineer, job ID 30215880, with an annual salary between $96,000.00 - $192,000.00
• Facilities Engineer, job ID 30218472, with an annual salary between $79,000.00 - $158,000.00
• Finance Specialist, Financial Planning & Analysis, posted October 22, 2026, with an annual salary between $79,000.00 - $158,000.00

The materials lead role is entitled to short-term cash incentives, subject to plan requirements.

The materials lead, the higher-paid facilities engineer and the finance specialist postings each describe work for a Carrier manufacturing facility. The facilities engineer, for example, supports the commissioning of the plant and its utilities, and the finance specialist tracks conversion cost, labor efficiency, scrap, inventory, headcount.

What Do the Posted Fort Worth Roles Ask For?

Here are the requirements in full for each role.

• The Materials Lead role requires a bachelor's degree and 8+ years of materials/supply-chain experience, including 3+ years leading planning, procurement, or logistics teams, and APICS certification (CPIM / CSCP) strongly preferred.
• The higher-paid Facilities Engineer role requires a bachelor's degree and 3+ years of facilities, plant engineering, or industrial utilities experience, and its preferred qualifications include a Bachelor's degree in Mechanical, Electrical, or Electromechanical Engineering.
• The second Facilities Engineer role asks for a bachelor's degree, 5+ years of facilities, plant-engineering or industrial-utilities experience, 5+ years experience working with building systems and utilities (electrical distribution, HVAC, compressed air, water), 3+ years of experience managing facility projects and coordinating contractors, and 5+ years of experience working with safety and building codes (OSHA, NFPA, NEC).
• The Finance Specialist role requires a bachelor's degree and 3+ years of Financial Planning and Analysis, or accounting experience, and lists manufacturing or plant-finance experience, including standard costing and absorption analysis as preferred.

Employees in the Materials Lead role are eligible for medical, dental and vision cover, retirement benefits, tuition assistance, paid vacation days, up to 15 days and paid holidays, up to 13 days. The specific benefits available to any employee may vary depending on state and local laws and eligibility factors, and applications will be accepted for at least 3 days from Job Posting Date: 13 October 2026.

What Do Factory and Engineering Jobs Pay Around Dallas-Fort Worth?

No production line pay is listed on Carrier's current Fort Worth job search, so federal wage data gives a benchmark. In the Dallas-Fort Worth-Arlington metro, production occupations averaged $23.83 an hour in May 2025, against $24.81 nationally.

Architecture and engineering occupations in the metro averaged $51.45 an hour in the same survey, and installation, maintenance, and repair roles averaged $29.86. The average for all metro jobs was $33.96 an hour in May 2025.

The proposed city terms set their own bar, a minimum average salary of $75,000 across the committed jobs. Corning's Wilmington incentive deal also sets an average-salary floor for its planned jobs.

If the state awards the designation, jobs counted for an Enterprise Zone refund must have an average weekly wage which meets or exceeds the average county weekly wage in the county where the site is located.

What Incentives Did Fort Worth Offer Carrier, and What Would They Require?

On Sept. 15 the council took up (M&C 26-0943) Carrier Corporation Public Hearing and Tax Abatement, which would designate Tax Abatement Reinvestment Zone No. 121 and authorize a Seven-Year Tax Abatement Agreement with Carrier Corporation for the site in Denton County.

The same item proposed a resolution nominating this project as a Texas Enterprise Zone Program Double Jumbo Project, and the council nominated the project for a Texas Enterprise Zone designation.

The Enterprise Zone program is a state sales and use tax refund program designed to encourage private investment and job creation in economically distressed areas of the state, and a Double Jumbo Project carries a Maximum Potential Refund of $2,500,000 and a maximum refund per job of $5,000. A company must first pay the applicable state sales and use tax on qualified expenditures in order to receive a refund of those taxes.

Under that state program, companies must create or retain jobs that employ a certain percentage of economically disadvantaged individuals, enterprise zone residents, or veterans, set at 25% of the company's new employees for a site inside a zone and 35% of the company's new employees for a site outside one. Only full-time jobs qualify for EZP award consideration, and a Double Jumbo Project may not count retained jobs for benefit. Jobs counted for a refund must be maintained through the end of the designation period, or for at least 3 years after the date on which tax benefits are received, whichever is later.

If Carrier misses the investment, job or salary minimums in the proposed city terms, it could forfeit or default on the abatement.

With the creation of 1,500 high-quality jobs, this project will add to Fort Worth's manufacturing hub at AllianceTexas while strengthening our energy and technology industries for years to come, Fort Worth Mayor Mattie Parker said, according to Carrier's announcement.

Why Is Carrier Building More Chillers Now?

Carrier's commercial HVAC business has record backlog levels and a robust and growing pipeline across many key verticals, and on a second quarter earnings call the company put its backlog up 40% from the previous year at $8 billion, not counting long-term agreements with data center hyperscalers.

At Morgan Stanley's annual Laguna Conference in September, Gitlin said the company would announce this new site in either Texas or Alabama in the next few weeks, adding that "that new site doubles the capacity that we already have."

Data centers are one source of that demand, and the Dallas-Fort Worth region had 180 data centers operating as of July, according to the Dallas Business Journal.

Carrier employed 47,000 people across the world as of the end of 2025 and reported net sales of $21.75 billion in 2025.

How Big Is the Fort Worth Factory Job Market Carrier Is Joining?

The Fort Worth-Arlington-Grapevine division had 109.5 thousand manufacturing jobs in September 2026, a preliminary figure, with a 12-month change of 0.1 percent in that month. Trade, transportation and utilities is bigger, at 291.8 thousand jobs in the same month.

The local unemployment rate was 4.3 percent in August 2026, a preliminary, not seasonally adjusted reading, down from 4.6 percent in June and July.

AllianceTexas has drawn other large plants in the past year, including an $876 million campus from Celestica and estimated $761 million super computer plants by Wistron.

How Does This Fit Carrier's Earlier U.S. Hiring Plan?

In May 2025, Carrier announced plans to invest $1 billion over five years in U.S. manufacturing, which is expected to create 4,000 jobs in research and development, manufacturing and field service.

That earlier plan was set to fund the expansion of existing facilities and construction of a manufacturing site to support the production of components for heat pumps and battery assemblies, as well as support innovations in liquid cooling for data centers and battery-enabled technologies.

Carrier will also partner with local schools and colleges to help prepare the next generation of skilled talent and work with dedicated workforce development organizations.

What This Means for Fort Worth Job Seekers, and What Should You Do Next?

The roles posted so far are salaried plant-support jobs, with no production line listings yet on Carrier's Fort Worth job search, while the proposed city terms count at least 495 full-time jobs by the end of 2029. Most of the hiring is still ahead, and it will show up on the same search page.

• Watch the right search. Check Carrier's job search for Fort Worth, TX each week, since three plant listings appeared more than a week before the announcement.
• Line up plant engineering experience. The facilities roles name electrical distribution, HVAC, compressed air, water systems and the OSHA, NFPA, NEC codes, so put that work at the top of your resume.
• Know the state hiring rule. If the state awards the designation, 25% or 35% of Carrier's new employees at the site must meet economically disadvantaged, enterprise zone residency or veteran requirements.
• Benchmark the pay. Use the metro average for production occupations cited above as a benchmark when an offer for a line role arrives.

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People Also Asked

Q: How many jobs will the Carrier Fort Worth plant create?

A: Carrier says the investment will create 1,500 advanced manufacturing, engineering and other jobs, and its proposed city incentives would require at least 495 full-time jobs by the end of 2029.

Q: When will the Carrier plant in Fort Worth open?

A: Carrier is expected to begin operations at the AllianceTexas site in 2027.

Q: How do I apply for Carrier jobs in Fort Worth?

A: Fort Worth openings are posted on Carrier's job search page, where the Fort Worth listings include a Finance Specialist, Financial Planning & Analysis for a Carrier manufacturing facility.

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