Status: Completed - In March 1999, C-FER launched an investigation into the causes of casing and slotted liner failures in heavy oil operations. Operators reported failures in primary, cyclic steam and Steam Assisted Gravity Drainage (SAGD) wells. A series of multi-sensor caliper logs were run in a number of deformed wellbores to characterize the deformations.

These deformations were then used to benchmark three-dimensional, large strain, finite element models of the interaction between formation movements and casing response. A number of different deformation mechanisms were identified and parametric analyses preformed to determine the impact of different completion strategies and various degrees of formation movement.

The project investigated how casing deformations were affected by such factors as casing and liner selection, slot patterns, initial wellbore curvature, wellbore orientation and perforating design and practices.

Contact: Peter Kis, Manager, Drilling & Completions