Will AI Replace Pump Operators, Except Wellhead Pumpers?

Monitor gauges and flowmeters and inspect equipment to ensure that tank levels, temperatures, chemical amounts, and pressures are at specified levels, reporting abnormalities as necessary.

Semi-structured cognitive task involving analysis, inspection, or monitoring.

Record operating data such as products and quantities pumped, stocks used, gauging results, and operating times.

Routine cognitive or manual task with high vulnerability to automation.

Plan movement of products through lines to processing, storage, and shipping units, using knowledge of interconnections and capacities of pipelines, valve manifolds, pumps, and tankage.

Complex problem-solving, strategic leadership, or high-empathy task requiring human judgment.

Turn valves and start pumps to start or regulate flows of substances such as gases, liquids, slurries, or powdered materials.

Semi-structured task combining routine and non-routine responsibilities.

Communicate with other workers, using signals, radios, or telephones, to start and stop flows of materials or substances.

Semi-structured task combining routine and non-routine responsibilities.

Connect hoses and pipelines to pumps and vessels prior to material transfer, using hand tools.

Semi-structured task combining routine and non-routine responsibilities.

Tend vessels that store substances such as gases, liquids, slurries, or powdered materials, checking levels of substances by using calibrated rods or by reading mercury gauges and tank charts.

Semi-structured task combining routine and non-routine responsibilities.

Clean, lubricate, and repair pumps and vessels, using hand tools and equipment.

Semi-structured task combining routine and non-routine responsibilities.

Read operating schedules or instructions or receive verbal orders to determine amounts to be pumped.

Semi-structured task combining routine and non-routine responsibilities.

Test materials and solutions, using testing equipment.

Semi-structured task combining routine and non-routine responsibilities.

Tend auxiliary equipment such as water treatment and refrigeration units, and heat exchangers.

Complex problem-solving, strategic leadership, or high-empathy task requiring human judgment.

Add chemicals and solutions to tanks to ensure that specifications are met.

Semi-structured task combining routine and non-routine responsibilities.

Collect and deliver sample solutions for laboratory analysis.

Semi-structured task combining routine and non-routine responsibilities.

Pump two or more materials into one tank to blend mixtures.

Semi-structured task combining routine and non-routine responsibilities.