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Key statistics

The identity block — every fact is canon, none is generated.

5 of 8

Track

Support

Family rungs priced

S1 · S2 · S3 · S4 · S5

51-0000

industrial_energy_operations

Coordinates

3 / 4 spaces

pay@2 · 2026-07

What this role is

Acts as the top individual-contributor technical authority for refinery unit operations, guiding process performance and troubleshooting across distillation, LNG, and related processing systems. At the Principal Support Specialist (S5) level, the role owns function-wide support practice, program-level and systemic support problems, and drives support strategy across the function. Subject-matter authority; shapes the practice.

What this level does

Use optimization and site-performance tools to track unit performance, analyze data and adjust operation to run the process system at its best while maintaining safety and product quality
Contribute to the creation and revision of operating procedures, startup/shutdown sequences and console standard operating conditions for the unit or complex based on accumulated operating experience
Act as the recognized process authority for the area, resolving the most complex operating problems and interlock/trip situations that others cannot diagnose
Facilitate the console crew as working lead during major turnarounds and unit re-streams, and provide guidance and on-console training to operators across the shift rotation

Knowledge applied: Expert operating knowledge of the area; contributes to the creation of operating procedures, console standards and optimization methods.
Complexity & problem solving: Resolves the most complex operating and interlock problems; develops operating techniques and uses optimization tools to improve how the process runs.
Collaboration & interaction: Acts independently and serves as working lead/facilitator for the console crew, providing peer guidance and on-console training during turnarounds and re-streams.
Typical experience: 6+ yrs; recognized specialist in refinery process operation.

Skills at this level

Operations Monitoring: — Watches gauges, dials and DCS display screens to confirm units and equipment are running within the correct flow, level, temperature and pressure ranges.
Tank Gauging and Sampling: — Reads automatic tank gauges to determine oil volume and flow rate, and collects representative product samples via bleeder valves or drop containers for lab analysis.
Operation and Control: — Operates refinery equipment and control systems — valves, pumps, compressors and auxiliary equipment — to move product and hold process conditions.
DCS/PLC Control Operation: — Runs distilling and treating units from the board using DCS/PLC systems, making setpoint changes and operating advanced control modes such as cascade, ratio and split-range within the operating envelope.
Process Upset Diagnosis: — Interprets real-time process data to identify off-spec product, equipment problems and unit upsets, and decides the corrective operating action.
Product Flow Synchronization: — Coordinates line-ups and transfers with other pumphouses to keep product moving continuously and to minimize contamination between product cuts.
Production and Processing Knowledge: — Applies knowledge of crude feedstocks, distilling and treating processes, quality control and product specifications to operate units effectively.
Startup and Shutdown Sequencing: — Executes and, at senior levels, leads the ordered steps to bring units and tanks into and out of service safely, including turnaround re-streams.
5S: — Keeps the unit and tank-farm work areas organized, clean and standardized as expected in refinery operating environments.
Refinery Optimization Tools: — Uses site-performance and optimization tools to track unit performance, review operating data and adjust the process to improve run efficiency and quality.
Teamwork: — Works alongside outside and board operators and other refinery associates to run the area as a coordinated shift crew.
Leadership and Communication: — Communicates operating status, upsets and instructions clearly across the crew and to supervision, and directs less experienced operators as a working lead.

Model-authored from 19 retrieved sources, then adversarially reviewed by an independent judge panel and held to a minimum-evidence floor before publication. Distinct from corpus-extracted content, which is labelled as such.

Pay across the ladder

Refinery — median with , by . Real canon data.

National-base pricing — this family's function differential is pending review, so dollar levels are not function-adjusted (level-over-level % is unaffected).

Pay figures are modeled estimates from our market equation — level-differentiated, with honest-wide bands. They refresh as new leveling evidence lands; treat per-role dollars as directional.

Demand — is the field growing, or just turning over?

SOC 51-0000 · national

Employment growth 2019–2024, BLS OEWSobserved

-13.6%Petroleum Pump System Operators, Refinery Operators, and Gaugers · United States

40,370 → 34,860 jobs

3,200 openings / year, split into:

replacement / exits 3,298

Growth — new jobs (-3%)Exits — backfill (100%)

This occupation is projected to contract — every opening is replacing someone leaving, not net new demand.

Projected growth 2024–34 contracting: -2.8%
Growth share of hiring: -3%
Exit / retention pressure high: 100%
Openings / year: 3,200

Two quantities, kept apart: observed = employment growth differenced from two BLS OEWS vintages (what already happened); projected = BLS Employment Projections 2024–34, openings decomposed into growth + exits (growth derived from projected employment change). Neither is a pay figure.

Where this role sits — growth vs. pay

level S5 held

Demand axis is projected growth (not raw openings — that just measures churn). A curated, de-duplicated set of recognizable occupations held at this level; this role is highlighted.

Where it pays — by metro

OEWS metro median

San Jose-Sunnyvale-Santa Clara, CA$104k

San Francisco-Oakland-Fremont, CA$93k

Washington-Arlington-Alexandria, DC-VA-MD-WV$86k

Boulder, CO$85k

Seattle-Tacoma-Bellevue, WA$85k

Boston-Cambridge-Newton, MA-NH$82k

Lexington Park, MD$80k

Trenton-Princeton, NJ$79k

Pay only — metro-level demand isn't in public data (it needs job postings). National median $63k; the demand-cube initiative will add growth-by-metro.

What changes across the ladder

Level-distinction canon isn't available for the adjacent levels of this profile yet.

Level differentiators

What separates S5 (S5 — Principal Support Specialist) from the levels around it — this level only. Every word is real canon for this profile.

Scope: Function-wide support practice
Autonomy: Sets direction for the support discipline
Complexity: Program-level and systemic support problems
Impact: Support strategy across the function
Decision rights: Authority over support practice and standards
Leadership: Subject-matter authority; shapes the practice

Full level-by-level matrix (side by side across the ladder) lives on the Ladder drill-down — not here.

Promotion

S5is the top of this family's ladder — progression from here is a lattice move (see adjacent roles below), not a rung.

Performance criteria for this profile render in the assessment kit →

People also watch

Nearest coordinate neighbors — same , same level. Each row's (confident / review / no match) comes from its — computed, not curated.

Profile	Key	Median	Δ structural
Director of Refinery Operations	jf_refinery::M5	$188,371†	confident0.06
Expert Refinery Process Technician	jf_refinery::P5	$138,423†	confident0.06
Advanced Refinery Operator	jf_refinery::S4	$56,408†	confident0.06
Chief Refining Officer	jf_refinery::E4	$389,207†	confident0.12

†National-base pricing — this family's function differential is pending review, so the dollar level is not function-adjusted.

Capability cluster

O*NET 51-8093

Core to this role. Click any element with an ⓘ for its O*NET definition. A job-specific capability model (SkillFrame) will sharpen this and add worked examples.

The Job Swatch

S5

jf_refinery::S5

Lead Refinery Operations Specialist

Refinery

The swatch is JobFrame's core primitive: a hueset deterministically by the role's superfunction, the profileKey as its color code, the level ladder, and a content fingerprint. Two swatches that look alike are alike.

Because every role carries computable coordinates, similarity, leveling, and pricing become measurable instead of arguable— the whole point of "Pantone for jobs."

Structural

structural@1

Where it sits— position in the work taxonomy + level (weighted Gower, level > function > focus).

Track: S
Superfunction: industrial_energy_operations
Function: plant_operations
Family: refinery
Universal level: 5 / 8

Content

content@2

What it's about— a fingerprint over the role's tasks & capabilities.

Two roles can sit far apart structurally yet be close in content — that gap is itself a signal.

3-state matching

How any two swatches compare — a real distance in coordinate space, resolved to a calibrated verdict (never a fake "94% match").

Mining Processing Plant · S5review0.17

Nuclear Power Plant · S5review0.17

Plant Maintenance (Energy/Mining) · S5review0.17

Plant Operations (Energy/Mining) · S5review0.17

Power Plant Management · S5review0.17

Renewables Plant · S5review0.17

Editions — frozen & versioned

structural@1live

Released 2026-06-17

content@2live

Released 2026-07-28

pay@2live

Released 2026-07-02

semantic@1live

Released 2026-07-02

Coordinates belong to a frozen, versioned edition — a coordinate computed today still means the same thing next quarter. Re-fitting issues a new edition, so comparisons are never silently redefined.

How to read this profile

Every number here is traceable — to a named source, a stated method, and an as-of date — and each value is labeled by how we know it: observed from data, computed by a model, projected forward, or governed canon. Nothing is a black box, and nothing is invented to fill a gap.

Where every number comes from

What	Source & method	Edition	State
Median pay + range	JobFrame pay equation (function base × family multiplier × level × focus differential)	pay@2	computed
Pay across the ladder	Same equation applied at each universal level	pay@2	computed
Demand — growth & openings	BLS Employment Projections; openings decomposed into growth + exits	EP 2024–34	projected
Pay by metro	BLS OEWS metropolitan medians	OEWS 2024	observed
Level distinctions	JobFrame universal-level canon (scope · autonomy · complexity · impact · decision rights · leadership)	canon	canon
Capability cluster	O*NET Knowledge / Skills / Abilities	O*NET 51-8093	computed
Coordinates	JobFrame coordinate system — structural (weighted Gower) + content fingerprint	structural@1 · content@2 · pay@2 · semantic@1	computed
Related roles	Nearest neighbors in the structural coordinate space	structural@1	computed

The principles behind the numbers

Ranges, not false precision

Pay is P10 · median · P90, never a single misleading number.

Three honest states, never a fake %

Role matches resolve to confident / review / no-match — a calibrated verdict, not a made-up percentage.

Provenance on every value

Each number carries whether it's observed, computed, projected, or canon — so you always know how much to lean on it.

Gaps shown as gaps

When a figure isn't available at the grain you need, we say so — we don't fabricate a number to fill the cell.

Frozen, versioned editions

Pay and coordinate editions are pinned, so a comparison you make today still means the same thing next quarter.

Privacy by min-N

Any aggregate over people is suppressed below a minimum count, so no individual is identifiable.

Freshness

As of2026-07-30Editioncanon-v2@2.1.0-completeSourcecanon-v2 cell + salary-benchmark (model)