Thermal Expansion Investigations of Oilwell Cements Using a Novel Apparatus

Abstract

In the coming future, renewable energies will become an essential source to fulfill the increasing global demand for energy. Geothermal energy is a form of renewable energy and is being widely adopted around the world where suitable temperature exists in subsurface layers. Therefore, for the extraction of geothermal energy, wells have to be drilled and assurance should be made that well integrity is not compromised. In that respect, cementation plays an important role as the cement in the geothermal well is continuously exposed to thermal cyclic loading. These loads might affect the behavior and properties of cement and therefore can jeopardize the well integrity. For that reason, knowing the geometrical changes that cement might have due to the thermal loadings should be properly investigated. This paper will be presenting experimental results on linear thermal expansion of the different classes of cement that are exposed to high temperatures which will help in understanding the behavior of the cement in the geothermal environment. The paper will present the setup that has been designed and the results obtained on several cement recipes as well as few reference materials. Our results provide extremely reliable results for future well integrity simulations.