SPE 93833
Steam Injection Casing Design
J. Wu, M.E. Gonzalez, and N. Hosn, SPE, ChevronTexaco
Copyright 2005, Society of Petroleum Engineers Inc.
This paper was prepared for presentation at the 2005 SPE Western Regional Meeting held in
Irvine, CA, U.S.A., 30 March – 1 April 2005.
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Abstract
Steam injection is a successful operation to increase heavy-oil
production, but the casing failure rates in steam injection wells
are very high. Severe thermal-loading to the casing is resulted
from steam injection operations and is attributed to the high
casing failure rates. The casing failures can be casing parted
due to fatigue and/or tensile load at cooling period, and can
also be casing ID restriction due to collapse and/or severe
buckling. This paper will briefly review the common casing
design practice, and provide mathematical modeling of casing
stresses in steam injection wells, and discuss ways of reducing
casing failures, including the use of high strength casing (such
as P-110 grade) to reduce casing hot-yield in most steam
injection wells.
The field data at Cymric 1Y field, Bakersfield, California are
also presented to support the use of high strength casing (P-
110 grade) in steam injection wells, based on the reduction of
casing failures in the past two years.
Introduction
It has been common practice in the oil industry for many years
to use low-strength casings (K55, N80, and L80) in steam
injection wells, despite a higher casing casing failure rate than
in conventional wells. Previous studies have shown that when
low strength casing is well-cemented, the support of the
cement may prevent casing failures (buckling and collapse),1,2
even when the casing is hot-yeilded under extreme axial
thermal compressive load during stream injection period. Of
course, the support of the cement cannot prevent the low
strength casing failure under tension load during soak or
production.
As shown in Fig. 1, the common steam injection practice
recognizes that the casing axial compressive stress increases
with the starts of steam injection and the casing becomes hot-
yielded at curtain temperature. After the casing is hot-yielded,
the casing axial compressive stress remains the same
(Dietrich-Whillhite model) or reduces slightly (Material work
hardening model), as the temperature continues increasing.
But with the support of cement, the casing does not fail due to
hot-yielding during steam injection. Instead, the casing fails in
tension during soak or production period, when casing
temperature drops and axial tension stress develops and
reaches the casing material yield strength.
However, a well-cemented casing condition is not always
achievable or maintainable in cyclic steam injection wells.
Poor cement jobs can result in no or poor cement outside
sections of casing; cement fall-back at the end of cement
pumping can leave the top casing section uncemented;
perforating may cause damage to cement near the
perforations; cyclic steam injection may fracture the cement.
Those may explain why the casing failure rate has been very
high in steam injection wells. The casing can fail under hot-
yield period in axial compression due to insufficient cement
support, or under the cold-yielded period in axial tension no
matter whether cement is good or not. The casing failures
related to hot-yield include casing ID restriction due to
collapse and/or severe buckling.
The following table shows the casing temperatures that could
cause casing hot-yield in compression for different grades of
casing. The initial temperature is assumed to be 15 oC (60 oF)
and the initial casing axial stress is assumed to be zero. Casing
material yield strength reduction at high temperature is
included. It is seen that low strength casing material K/J 55
and N/L 80 will all become hot-yielded, when casing is
heated-up to a temperature of 400 F. deg. which is lower than
steam injection temperatures in most steam injection projects.
Table 1. Casing Grade Hot-Yield Temperature
Nominal Yield Compressive Yield
Casing Grade Strength Temperature
(Mpa/psi) (Deg.C/Deg.F)
J-55, K-55 380/55000 150/303
L-80, N-80 550/80000 203/397
C-95, T-95 655/95000 232/450
P-110 760/110000 260/500
Q-125 860/125000 287/548
Two field cases of production casing failures in thermal wells
from ChevronTexaco Indonesia operations are shown below
(Figs. 2 and 3), where low strength casing (K-55) was used
2 SPE 93833

and failed at the uncemented and/or poor cemented sections. between casing and the cement would depend on the cement
Fig. 2 shows a collapsed 7” K55 production casing at about 40 and formation properties. For the uncemented or poor
ft depth in a thermal steam injection well, where the top of cemented sections, the casing may “freely” expand by this
cement (TOC) was at about 56 ft due to the fall-back of 0.019 inch in diameter as the casing is heated-up, and no
cement during cementing job. Fig. 3 shows a blockage of 7” additional contact pressure would be developed to the casing
K55 production casing at about 160 ft depth in a thermal sections (with ignoring annulus fluid pressure increase as the
steam injection well, where bad cement bond was detected casing expends radically).
though the top of cement (TOC) was at about 120 ft.
By resolving casing thermal elastic strain differential equation,
Figure 4 is a down-hole video picture of failed production the comprehensive casing triaxial stresses in steam injection
casing by collapse/restriction, after milling-out the restriction, wells can be expressed as (Appendix A):
from a thermal well in ChevronTexaco Indonesia operations.
Pb − Pa a 2 b 2 Pb b 2 − Pa a 2
σ = − (3)
b2 − a2 r2 b2 − a2
r
Casing Thermal Stress
P − Pa a b 2 2
Pb b 2 − Pa a 2
Based on the above discuss, we need to design casings in σθ = − 2b − (4)
steam injection wells to withstand not only axial tension but b − a2 r2 b2 − a2
also axial thermal compression, in order to reduce casing F
failure rate in steam injection wells. σ a
= + ∆σ a (5)
As
∆ Pb b 2 − ∆ P a a 2
Casing thermal stress is developed as high temperature steam Λσ = −2µ − αE∆T (6)
b2 − a2
a
is injected into the wells through tubing and/or production
casing, heating-up the casing to expand. However, when the
casing is restricted from expanding due to hole geometry and The casing external pressure (Pb) at steam injection will
friction, high compressive thermal stress will be developed depend on whether casing is cemented and how much cement
and may easily exceed the low-strength casing material yield is deformed, as discussed before. More complicated modeling
strength, causing a hot-yielding of the production casing in is needed to resolve the casing-cement contact pressure at
steam injection wells. steam injection if required. However, for engineering
applications, an assumption of zero increase of casing external
The casing thermal expansion and thermal stress is defined as: pressure can be used for poorly cemented or uncemented
sections which are always weak points regarding casing
ε = α ∆T (1) failures. The casing axial stress increase due to steam injection
can then be approximated as (by letting ∆Pa = 0 and ∆Pb = 0):
∆σ = −αE∆T (2)
Λσ a
= −α E∆T (7)
For a 1500 ft long of 7”, 32#, L-80 production casing string in
a vertical steam injection well, with an average temperature It is the same expression as the thermal axial compressive
increase of 400 deg.F, the intended thermal expansion of the stress in Eq. 2. We have known that this casing thermal axial
casing string (Fig. 5) in length (∆L) and diameter (∆D) can be compressive stress due to steam injection can be very large,
calculated as (if no geometrical restriction exists): and can cause casing hot-yield.

ε = 0.0000069*400 = 0.00276 The casing hot-yielding under the tri-axial stresses condition
can be determined through the equivalent von Mises stress
∆L = εL = 0.00276*1500 = 4.14 ft (σe), when it exceeds the casing material yield strength (σy):

∆D = εD = 0.00276*7 = 0.019 in. σ e = (σ r2 + σ θ2 + σ a2 - σ r σ θ - σ r σ a - σ θ σ a )1/2 > σ y (8)

If the thermal expansion is restricted from axial expansion, the

above thermal axial expansion will be converted into a thermal
axial compressive stress:
∆σ = -εE = -0.00276*30000000 = - 82,899 psi
This thermal axial compressive stress has already exceeded
the L-80 grade casing material yield strength of 80,000 psi,
and the casing would hot-yield under this temperature. The
thermal expansion in radial direction would deform the
cement outside the casing and the contact pressure generated
Remember the casing material yield strength (σy) should
reduce at high temperature, and the following linear reduction
approximation of the casing material strength may be used:
T − 100
σ y |T >100 deg . F = σ y |T = ambient ∗ (1 − ) (9)
2333 .3
Use High Strength Casing
Figure 6 shows the modeling result of a 7” 29# L-80
production casing set at 2000 ft depth in an example vertical
SPE 93833
steam injection well. The casing is restricted from expanding
axially. Steam injection temperature is 550 deg. F and steam
injection rate is 2500 bbl/day, through a 3 1/2” tubing (tubing
packer at 1800 ft, 9 ppg packer fluid, perforations at 1900 ft).
The undisturbed formation temperature is 60 deg. F at surface
with a gradient of 3.2 deg/100ft. Cement top is 100 ft below
the wellhead due to cement fall-back .
The modeling result shows that the 7” 29# L-80 production
casing temperature will increase up to more than 400 deg. F
after 3-days’ steam injection (the 7” casing is labeled as
“Casing 1” in the Fig. 6) and the axial compressive load
reaches – 600,000 lb, causing the casing hot-yielding (the
casing body yield strength is 589,000 lb after temperature
derating). As shown in Fig. 6, the casing’s load line for
“injection 3 days” goes out of the von Mises yield ellipse in
axial compression load, indicating hot-yield. The 7” casing
also buckles on the top 100 ft section due to a lack of cement
support, causing a big jump on the axial compressive load
curve (labeled as “with bending”). Casing collapse and
connection leak in the top 100 ft of uncemented casing section
will be a serious issue, as the casing is severely buckled under
an unstable hot-yielded status.
Figure 7 models a 7” 29# P-110 casing instead of the 7” 29#
L-80 casing in the same well. The 7” 29# P-110 casing load
line now stays within the von Mises yield ellipse, indicating
no hot-yield, though the casing is still under the same axial
compressive load. This is samply because of the higher
material yield strength of the P-110 grade casing (the casing
body yield strength is now 810,000 lb after temperature
derating). The risk of casing collapse and connection leak
undet hot-yield is reduced, by switching from L-80 grade
casing to P-110 grade casing in this example, as the casing
now stays in a more stable elastic status.
The use of high strength casing (P-110 or even Q-125) in
steam injection wells will not be affected by sour cracking,
despite the possible introduction of high concentrations of H2S
into the wellbore. This is because (1) the casing temperature is
usually higher than the sour cracking threadhold, and (2) the
casing tensile stress level is usually low (on both axial tensile
stress and hoop tensile stress) in terms of percentage of casing
material yield strength, for typical steam injection wells (low
internal pressure and shallow depth).
As we know, an industry-wide rule for P-110 and Q-125 grade
casings is that they may be used in sour service condition for
temperature above 175 °F and 225 °F respectively. Cymric 1Y
field data have shown that the wellhead temperatures of their
steam injection wells are all above 200 deg. F even during the
production or shut-in conditions. Fig. 8 shows that for up to
1% of H2S concentration and temperature at 75°F, no sour
cracking would occur on P-110 or Q-125 casing if the casing
max. tensile stress is less than 40% of the casing material yield
strength. For the above 7” production casing set at 2000 ft in
the example well, the maximum hoop tensile stress is about
8100 psi under a 1000 psi injection pressure condition, and the
maximum axial tensile tress is about 6000 psi from the casing
3
weight, which both are less than 10% of the P-110 grade
casing material yield strength.
ChevronTexaco Cymric 1Y field experience of using high
strength casing in steam injection wells also supports the
above analysis. Cymric 1Y field development of steam-
injection started in the 1980s. About 400 wells were
completed by 2002 using low strength casing (K-55, N/L-80),
and about 19% of the wells (69 wells) have seen production
casing failures. The casing failure in these wells started as
early as the 20th stream injection cycles, as shown in Fig. 9.
There have been three types of production casing failures
witnessed in Cymric 1Y steam injection wells where K55 or
L80 grade production casing was used: (1)
Collapse/restriction/bending, (2) Parted, and (3) Holes.
After 2002, the filed switched to high strength P-110
production casing which has been used on over 60 new wells
since. None of the new casing has failed on these new wells,
some of which have undergone more than 35 steam injection
cycles. Table 2 lists the well completion information of
Cymric 1Y steam injection wells before and after 2002.
Other Things to Consider
Thermal Wellhead. New thermal wellhead allows production
casing to expand (Fig 10), and therefore can effectively avoid
casing thermal loading and prevent casing hot-yielding and
buckling of the uncemented casing section near wellhead due
to cement fall-back.
Tubing Open-Annulus. When steam injection is through
tubing and a tubing packer is used on the bottom of tubing, an
open tubing annulus, achieved by allowing the packer fluid to
evaporate during steam injection, can effectively reduce the
heat transfer to the casing, and therefore reduce casing hot-
yield. Fig. 11 shows the temperature of the 7” 29# L-80 casing
in the example well is reduced from above 400 deg. F to about
350 deg. F, by use of tubing open-annulus during steam
injection operation. It reduces the 7” 29# L-80 casing hot-
yield accordingly.
Casing Centralizers. The use of casing centralizers helps
reduce casing buckling in any poor cement sections, especially
casing buckling in the uncemeted casing top section due to
cement fall-back . Fig. 12 shows the 7” 29# L-80 casing in the
example well will be no longer hot-yielded (casing load line
stays inside casing von Mises yield ellipse), when casing
centralizers (0.2 in. clearance between centralizer blade OD
and 10 ¾” casing ID) are used on the top uncemented section,
in addition to the use of the tubing open-annulus.
Casing Pre-tension Completion. Casing pre-tension
completion is to pump quick-set cement slurry to the bottom
section of the production casing, and land the casing with a
pulled tension at the casing top when the quick-set cement at
the bottom section of the casing can hold the amount of pulled
tension. This approach can help achieve a lower casing axial
compressive load later in steam injection period and avoid hot-
4 SPE 93833

yielding of the casing. As shown in Fig. 13, when a 300,000 lb
pre-tension is applied to the 7”, 29#, L-80 production casing in
the above example well, the casing axial compressive load
under steam injection condition will be reduced accordingly,
and the 7”, 29#, L-80 production casing will not be hot-
yielded (casing load line stays inside casing von Mises yield
ellipse).
Casing Connection. High compression efficiency casing
connection is needed in steam injection wells, because of the
severe well conditions of high temperature, extreme axial
compressive load, and possible H2S envoirnment. Premium
connection with torque shoulder and metal-seal will perform
much better than the common API BTC and LTC connections,
which are low cost on connection itself but may present high
risk of conncetion failure.
E: Casing material Young’s modulus, 30,000 ksi for steel.
F: Casing axial load before steam injection, lbf
Pa: Casing internal pressure at steam injection, psi
Pb: Casing external pressure at steam injection, psi
∆Pa: Casing internal pressure increase at steam injection, psi
∆Pb: Casing external pressure increase at steam injection, psi
T: Casing temperatute, deg. F
∆T: Temperature change, deg. F
α: Casing thermal expansion coefficient, 0.0000069 /deg. F
ε: Thermal strain
σa: Casing axial stress, psi
σr: Casing radial stress, psi
σθ: Csing hoop stress, psi
∆σ: Casing thermal stress, psi
∆σa: Casing axial stress increase at steam injection, psi

Conclusions
Based on the above discussion and analysis, we need to
conduct casing design in steam injection wells not only by the
tensile stress failure design when the casing is cool, but also
by the compressive stress hot-yield design when the casing is
heated-up. Such casing design will help reduce casing failures
in steam injection wells, as casing hot-yield is an unstable
stauts where casing collapse and severe bucklig can easily
occur, especially when sufficient cement support is not
present. The main approaches to reduce casing failures
relating to hot-yielding of casing in steam injection wells
include:
Acknowledgments
The authors wish to thank ChevronTexaco for permission to
publish this paper.
Reference
1. Lepper, G.B.: “Production Casing Performance in a
Thermal Field”, JCPT, Sept. 1998.
2. Maruyama, K. and et al: “An Experimental Study of
Casing Performance under Thermal Cycling Conditions”,
SPE Drilling, June 1990.
3. Bourgoyne Jr. A. T. and et al: “Applied Drilling
Engineering”, SPE Textbook Series, Vol. 2, 1986.

1. Obtain a good cement job to provide sold cement

support to casing string against casing failures; Appendix A: Casing Thermal Stress Modeling
2. Use high strength casing: High strength casing (P-
110 and Q-125) can help reduce casing hot-yielding by their 1. Casing thermal elastic strain differential equation:
high material yield strength;
3. Use thermal wellhead: Thermal wellhead allows the 1+ µ
expansion of production casing when it is heated up. It helps ∇ 2Φ = α∆T (A1)
avoid production casing hot-yielding and severe buckling at 1− µ
the top section of casing where cement may not exist due to
cement fall-back; Φ: Thermal elastic displacement potential
4. Use tubing open-annulus if possible to reduce heat ∇ : Laplace opertator
2

transfer to production casing, resulting in lower casing

temperature and less risk of casing hot-yield; µ: Poisson’s ratio
5. Use solid centralizer on top section of production
casing to prevent severe buckling when the top casing section 2. For axis-asymmetry and plane-strain condition, it
is not cemented due to cement fall-back ; becomes:
6. Use pre-tension on production casing. Production 1 d ⎛ dΦ ⎞ 1 + µ
casing pre-tension helps to reduce the extreme thermal axial ⎜r ⎟= α ∆T (A2)
compressive load in steam injection period and therefore r dr ⎝ dr ⎠ 1 − µ
reduce production casing hot-yielding risk at steam injection F
condition;
σa = + ∆σ a (A3)
As
7. Bleeding any build-up pressure in the production
casing annulus through wellhead valve if possible, as this can ∆σ a = µ ( ∆σ r + ∆σ θ ) − α E∆T (A4)
reduce production casing collapse, especially when production
casing is hot-yielded under steam injection condition. 3. Find a particular solution:
Nomenclature
E d 2Φ Eα∆T
a: Casing internal radius, in. σθ1 = − =− (A5)
As: Casing cross-section area, in.2 1 + µ dr 2
2(1 − µ )
b: Casing external radius, in.
SPE 93833 5

E 1 dΦ Eα∆T
σ r1 = − =− (A6)
1 + µ r dr 2(1 − µ )
dΦ 1+ µ P b
ur 1 = = α∆Tr (A7)
dr 2(1 − µ ) a
b
4. Find a common solution: P a

A
σθ 2 = − + 2C (A8)
r2
A
σ r2 = + 2C (A9)
r2
1− µ2 ⎡ µ A µ ⎤
ur 2 = ⎢ − (1 + ) + 2Cr (1 −
1 − µ ⎥⎦
)
E ⎣ 1− µ r Fig. A1 Casing Thermal Stress Modeling.
(A10)

5. Final the complete solution to meet the following

stress boundary conditions:
σ r (r = b) = − Pb σ r (r = a) = − Pa

Pb − Pa a 2b 2 Pbb 2 − Pa a 2
σθ = σθ1 + σθ 2 = − − (A11)
b2 − a 2 r 2 b2 − a2

Pb − Pa a 2b 2 Pbb 2 − Pa a 2
σ r = σ r1 + σ r 2 = − (A12)
b2 − a 2 r 2 b2 − a 2
F
σ a
= + ∆σ a
(A13)
As
∆Pbb2 − ∆Paa2
∆σ a = µ(∆σ r + ∆σθ ) − αE∆T = −2µ − αE∆T
b2 − a2
(A14)
6 SPE 93833

(Dietrich-Whillhite model) (Material work hardening model)

Fig. 1 Common casing design schematic in thermal wells.1

Steam Injection: 4000

Steam Injection: 6000
bspd, 500 deg.F,
bspd, 500 deg.F,
700 psi
700 psi
Steam leak from 7”
Injection Profile Tool
casing annulus
didn’t pass 40’
valve after 8
after 6 months,
months,
Casing Collapse at 40’
Identified and milled
identified by
through casing
down-hole
blockage at
video,
160’,
TOC: 56’, with Good
TOC: 120’, with Bad
Cement Bond
Cement Bond
data.
data.

Fig. 2 Collapsed 7” K55 casing near top. Fig. 3 Deformed 7” K55 casing at poor cement.
SPE 93833 7

∆T

Fig. 4 Down-hole video picture of milled-out failed casing. Fig. 5 Casing thermal expansion illustration.

Fig. 6 7” 29# L-80 casing is hot-yielded in the example well.

8 SPE 93833

Fig. 7 7” 29# P-110 casing is not hot-yielded in the example well.

Fig. 8 Maximum safe stress level for various grades of casing and H2S concentrations at 75°F.3
SPE 93833 9

1Y Well Failures

30%

25%

20%
19%
Failure Rate

15%

10%

5%

0%
0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90 100 110 120
# of Cycles

Fig. 9 Cymric 1Y casing failure rate on low strength casing completion.

Fig. 10 New thermal wellhead (courteous of CAMERON).

10 SPE 93833

Fig. 11 Reduction of casing temperature and hot-yield by tubing open-annulus.

Fig. 12 Reduction of casing hot-yield and buckling by tubing open-annulus and casing centralizers.
SPE 93833 11

Fig. 13 Pre-tension production casing helps reduce casing hot-yield during steam injection.
12 SPE 93833

Table 2. Well completion information of Cymric 1Y steam injection projects

Year 1980-1882 1983-1987 1988-1995 1996 1997-1998 1999 2000-2001 2002-2003 2004

Number of Well Drilled 10 39 88 68 177 69 62 92 92

Size 16, 20 16 18
Conductor
Depth 40-90 80-85 90-95

Hole Dia. 17.25 13.5 14.75 12.25

Drilling
MW 8.7-9.7 8.7-14

Dia. 10.75 13.375 10.75 9.625

Weight 40.5# 54.5# 40.5# 36#

Surface String Grade K-55 P110 L80

Casing
Thread BTC

Depth 200-500' 500-1500'

Above or Below
A
P/M
Cement Class G Class C

Hole Dia. 7 9.875 8.5

Drilling
MW 8-12

Casing / Liner L C

Dia. 5.5 6.625 7 5.5 - 7

Production String Weight 17# 23# 20# - 23#

Casing
Grade K-55 L-80 P110
SHLT
Thread BTC LTC HYD563 HYD563
HYD563
Depth 1200-2500'

Cement Class G Class C Type III Foam Litecrete

Top Perf
0-550'
Distance Below
Perf
Perf. Length 150-650' 50-150' 30-50'

Dia. 3.5 - 2.875 2.875

Weight 13.8# - 6.5# 6.5#

Tubing
Grade Thermocase - J-55 J-55
Completion
Distance Above
0 - 600' 0-300' 0-200'
Top Perf
Yes / No No Yes No Yes No Yes

Type Otis Otis, Guiberson ER-VI, WHI Guiberson G-16 Baker, G-16 WHI Guiberson G-16 Weatherford, Guiberson G-16
Packer
Distance Above
< 100' 200-300' 100-200' 0-100'
Top Perf
Expansion Joint
Packer Surf
@ Surf. Or