Operations benchmarks are measures of typical refining industry performance on a specific operational dimension. These are used to compare an individual refinery's performance against the rest of the industry to identify areas of strength and weakness.
Benchmarks are used on a wide variety of operational measures, including:
Unit availability
Factor inputs (energy, labor, catalyst, chemicals, etc)
Benchmarks are typically either average values for the whole industry or for quartiles reflecting best to worst performance groups.
Benchmarks are typically normalized for the size and complexity of the refinery to provide more meaningful comparison.
In refining the industry standard set of benchmarks is compiled by Solomon Associates and is used widely across the industry around the world.