Refinery operations · Commissioning and start-up · Operator competency
It ends when the plant runs steadily with its own people. I’m Roger Tablero. For 27 years I have worked on that gap in refineries in Venezuela, Kuwait, Malaysia and Angola, from field operator to Operations Coordinator.
Refineries rarely struggle at start-up because of equipment. They struggle because three things were built separately.
Written by people who will not execute them.
It ends on handover day.
The operator meets them for the first time with the plant already running.
The operator is the one who has to make them fit, on shift. Operational readiness means building the three together and staying until the plant runs steadily with its own people.
Sincor, a strategic association of Total, Statoil and PDVSA, trained me for two years before its upgrader started: six months of theory, a year in the field at an operating refinery, then the commissioning of my own unit. They called it world-class training. Today we would call it operational readiness. Later I was on the other side: I trained new technicians in the field at Pengerang and, at Cabinda, designed role-based training for around 40 operators.
Each plant shows the phases of its life I worked through.
| Operator training | Pre-commissioning | Commissioning | Start-up | Steady operation | Scheduled turnarounds | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Sincor, later PDVSA Petrocedeño | worked | worked | worked | worked | worked | worked |
| Al Zour refinery | worked | worked | not part of my time there | not part of my time there | not part of my time there | not part of my time there |
| Pengerang refinery | worked | not part of my time there | worked | worked | worked | worked |
| Cabinda Refinery | worked | not part of my time there | worked | worked | worked | worked |
01Venezuela · 1999–2018
Extra-heavy crude upgrader
Field operator to Operations Superintendent
Two years of training before start-up, then pre-commissioning, commissioning and first start-up of the delayed coker. Every role up to Operations Superintendent. Four major scheduled turnarounds, one of them as operations lead for the coker in 2014.
02Kuwait · 2018–2021
ARDS complex, three units of 110,000 b/d
Panel and field operator
A year in the field learning the units (line tracing, systems, tags, manuals and exams), three months of DCS training with Honeywell, then pre-commissioning of the three ARDS units. The pandemic pushed the start-up back, and I left before it.
03Malaysia · 2021–2024
ARDS and hydrogen compression, 300,000 b/d refinery
Senior field operator
I joined after the refinery’s first start-up. Re-commissioning and restart of two ARDS units and the hydrogen compression unit, scheduled shutdowns for catalyst change-out on both units, and field training of new technicians.
04Angola · 2024–today
New 30,000 bpd hydroskimming refinery
Operations Coordinator
Coordination of process operations through commissioning and the transition to stable operation, design of role-based training for around 40 operators, operations input to the scope and sequences of scheduled turnarounds, and design of the operations management system.
Systems, methods and records that stayed in use after I built them.
I designed a management model for the operations department of a refinery, built from its real context and meant to evolve with it. One framework holds three components together.
The framework
It ties together the whole management environment of operations: how people are trained, how decisions are made, how information flows, and the documents and programs underneath. Its purpose is that these work as one system, aimed at safety, reliability, quality and efficiency. A certification such as ISO 9001 rests on that maturity.
People
On-the-job training structured by role: field technician, lead technician and control room technician. Each role has a package with the knowledge and skills the job demands, a diagnostic assessment that shows strengths and gaps, and a certification assessment. It covers about 40 operators. It turns operating experience into verifiable competence and reduces dependence on informal knowledge.
Decisions
It sets who decides what, with which information and how often, through three cadences: daily coordination, weekly planning and monthly performance review. It relies on indicators, action and risk management, structured problem solving, and authority and responsibility matrices. Its aim is to align the organization at every level and turn each deviation into a decision with an owner and a deadline.
Information
It starts from a conviction: information is one of the most valuable assets an operation has. The Single Record supports the workflow of the shift, from control readings and shift events to work instructions, tank volumes, chemical stock, and daily, monthly and executive reports. It is designed so that each piece of data is captured once and stays traceable.
Document framework and operating programs
An ISO 9001:2015 framework for operations, designed as my engineering thesis: procedure taxonomy, templates, a writing guide and a workflow to create, track and review each document. More than 200 procedures and work instructions are built on it, along with the operations manual and the KPI manual.
Recalculated alarm and trip levels for crude and product tanks, using API 2350 and ISA 18.2 as operating guides. Setpoints came from measured field times: valve travel, system line-up and the operator’s walk to the farthest tank. Working volume rose to about 85% of capacity within safety and mechanical integrity limits, and the refinery’s stock sheet was built on that basis.
Commissioning reports, technical specifications for process and control modifications, and root cause analyses delivered as formal reports.
Delayed coker · method
5days, against about 20 for the contracted cleaning
As operations engineer I designed an in-house method to clean the cutting water tank, with an unplanned 15-day shutdown window and no time to hire the contractor. The idea came from the coke drums: with a thin jet, the crews clearing the drum bottom only cut the coke at the flange and nothing flowed; with a thick, smooth, abundant stream, the coke broke up and flowed. I reasoned that the contractor’s hydrojet did what the thin jet did, which is why that cleaning took so long. We fluidized the settled coke from the top with a portable fire monitor and pumped it from a bottom nozzle to the coke pit with a rented slurry pump. Our own operations crew finished in five days, with no confined space entry. The contracted cleaning used to take about twenty.
Gas recovery unit · root cause
1lubrication hole instead of 2
After a major turnaround, the gas recovery compressor kept tripping on vibration during its automatic ramp-up. I was asked to lead a multidisciplinary team to find out why. We evaluated the train as a whole (motor, Voith coupling and compressor), normalized what could be normalized, and ruled out causes one by one with tests, without changing the scenario. The root cause was a bearing in the Voith, on the compressor side, that did not match the specification: one lubrication hole instead of two. With the correct bearing, the compressor started without problems, in automatic and in manual.
Why only in automatic
Ruled out one by one, with tests
Delayed coker · turnaround
2014one of four major scheduled turnarounds
In 2014 I led the delayed coker’s turnaround on behalf of operations. Over those years I planned and directed its scheduled shutdowns and start-ups, and delivered improvement projects on slide valves and heavy diesel filters.
Distillation and coking · quality
12years apart: 2013 and 2025
In 2013 PDVSA Petrocedeño recognized my contribution to implementing the Quality Management System for the distillation and coking sub-process. In 2025 I designed one from the ground up.
Guest lecture · 2024
Two-hour online lecture for final-semester Petrochemical Engineering students, Universidad Yacambú.
Engineering thesis · 2025
Universidad Yacambú. Highest academic index of the graduating class.
LinkedIn · 2026
How Sincor prepared its operators for two years before start-up, and why operational readiness does not end at handover. In Spanish.
Read the postIf you work on commissioning, start-up or operator competency, I would like to hear how you do it.
Spanish · English · Portuguese