Turnaround Industry Networking Conference
TINC America Regional Conference
- May 14, 2026
- Houston, TX
TINC 2026 Regional Networking Session
About TINC
The 2026 Turnaround Industry Network Conference (TINC) brought together industry leaders from refining, chemicals, and manufacturing sectors to share insights, benchmark performance, and explore the evolving challenges shaping turnaround execution.
As an owners-only forum established to promote the exchange of best practices, TINC continues to provide a unique platform for candid discussion, peer learning, and data-driven decision-making across the STO lifecycle.
A Forum for Industry Alignment and Insight
This year’s US Regional event welcomed participants from 23 companies, representing a diverse cross-section of industry. Discussions centered on key performance drivers including safety, planning readiness, scope management, cost competitiveness, and schedule predictability.
With a mix of presentations, breakout sessions, and networking opportunities, the conference reinforced TINC’s role as a leading forum for understanding industry trends and identifying opportunities for performance improvement.
Industry Trends: Progress with Persistent Challenges
Benchmarking insights presented during the conference highlighted both encouraging progress and ongoing challenges across the industry.
Safety performance continues to improve compared to the past decade, while turnaround readiness has steadily increased, reinforcing its strong correlation with better safety, cost, and schedule outcomes.
At the same time, several challenges remain:
- Schedule predictability continues to be a primary driver of unsuccessful events
- Cost escalation has increased in recent years, driven by market uncertainty
- Higher complexity events are associated with lower success rates
- Field productivity has declined over time, despite improvements in planning
These trends underscore a central message: while industry capabilities are improving, consistent execution and predictability remain critical areas for focus.
Guest Speakers: Turning Strategy into Execution
Two guest speaker sessions provided practical perspectives on improving turnaround execution through organizational alignment and field-focused practices.
Jason Mann, North American Turnaround Manager at Air Products, addressed the ongoing challenge of balancing centralized processes with local execution flexibility. His session highlighted how standardization can drive consistency across a portfolio, while emphasizing the need for adaptability to account for site-specific constraints.
Drawing on Air Products’ experience, Mann emphasized that success depends not only on well-defined processes, but also on strong cultural adoption, leadership sponsorship, and empowering teams at the local level. The session reinforced the importance of using structured processes to guide execution—without limiting agility and ownership in the field.
Sara Passone, Turnaround Specialist at bp, focused on contractor oversight throughout the turnaround lifecycle, introducing a more dynamic and risk-based approach.
Her session highlighted that traditional oversight models often focus heavily on compliance and documentation, rather than verifying how work is actually performed. By shifting to a field-centric, risk-based model, organizations can better ensure that critical barriers are functioning as intended and intervene earlier to prevent issues.
The approach, built around a continuous “Plan–Do–Check–Act” cycle, enables more effective performance management and stronger outcomes across safety, quality, and productivity.
STO Bench: Enabling Data-Driven Decision Making
A key highlight of the conference was the introduction of STO‑Bench, a cloud-based, AI informed, benchmarking tool designed to enhance how organizations plan and evaluate turnaround events.
Presented by AJ Kowaleuski, the session demonstrated how organizations can compare their events against industry benchmarks across scope, cost, direct field labor hours, and schedule to better understand performance gaps. Scenario analysis built into the tool helps users model events with various units to evaluate the impact to cost, schedule, labor hours, and equipment counts.
By moving beyond high-level benchmarking to actionable, event-level insights, STO‑Bench supports more informed decision-making during early planning phases, ultimately improving competitiveness and predictability.
Collaborative Learning Through Breakout Sessions
Breakout sessions once again proved to be a key value driver of the conference, providing a forum for peer-to-peer discussion on critical industry challenges.
Topics included:
- Corporate turnaround challenges
- Driving cultural change
- KPIs and leading indicators
- Capital project integration
These sessions enabled participants to share practical experiences, exchange ideas, and identify solutions that can be applied within their own organizations.
Key Takeaways from TINC 2026
Several themes emerged consistently throughout the conference:
- Contractor oversight must focus on execution in the field—not just compliance
- Organizational culture and alignment are essential to translating strategy into results
- Industry continues to struggle with Long Range Planning optimization challenges
- Optimization of corporate and site turnaround organizations is critical to success
- AI is an emerging trend in Industry and when used appropriately can be a powerful asset
Closing and Networking
The conference concluded with an evening networking event at Topgolf in Katy, Texas, giving attendees the opportunity to continue discussions and strengthen relationships in a more informal setting.
Looking Ahead
As TINC continues to evolve, the 2026 conference reinforced its role as a critical forum for advancing industry performance. By combining benchmarking insights with practical, experience-based discussions, TINC provides organizations with the tools and perspectives needed to improve turnaround outcomes and deliver greater business value.
AP-Networks America is pleased to announce its annual Regional Networking Conference, taking place in Houston, Texas on May 14, 2026 at the Houston Marriott Energy Corridor.
This one-day, no-cost event, open exclusively to owner-operator organizations, is designed to bring together STO and Capital Project professionals from across the United States’ industrial sector for a day of high-impact learning, collaboration, and networking.
Attendees will hear a series of presentations delivered from their Industry peers as well as insights and trends gathered from the AP-Networks STO database.
The conference will also include a series of interactive roundtable discussions, giving participants the chance to explore the latest trends, challenges, and best practices shaping today’s Capital Project and STO environments.
This is a unique opportunity to connect with peers, exchange ideas, and learn from top performers all in a vendor-free environment designed to foster open discussion and honest sharing.
We look forward to welcoming you to a day that promises valuable insights, meaningful connections, and actionable takeaways to support your organization’s success in 2026 and beyond.
| When: | May 14, 2026 |
| Where: | Houston Marriott – Energy Corridor 16011 Katy Freeway, Houston, TX, 77094, US |
| Cost: | Complimentary |
Social Event
Top Golf
Conference Agenda
- May 15, 2025
- Houston, TX
08:00 - 09:00
Breakfast and Registration
09:00 - 09:50
Conference Welcome and Industry Benchmarking Trends - AP-Networks
09:50 - 10:30
Building a Culture of Turnaround Excellence
Chad Harrison, INVISTA
10:30 - 10:50
Networking Break
10:50 - 11:30
A Small Refiner’s Turnaround Journey: From ‘Stories & Optimism’ to ‘Data & Discipline
Dave Maher, Delek
11:30 - 12:30
Lunch
12:30 - 13:20
Benchmarking Panel Discussion - AP-Networks
13:20 - 14:10
Breakout Session 1
14:10 - 14:40
Networking Break
14:40 - 15:30
Breakout Session 2
15:30 - 16:00
Closing Remarks and Key Takeaways
16:00 - 17:00
Networking
17:00 - 19:00
Evening Program at Top Golf
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The premier turnaround symposium to share best practices proven to deliver safe, event-free, and predictable turnaround outcomes.