Vermiculite Particles as an Additive for Oil Well Cement

The process of cementing a well is essential to ensuring the well doesn't collapse. The cement slurry is pumped into the annulus between the casing and the formation. Cement restricts the movement of formation fluids while also supporting the casing. Different types of additives have been used in the design of cement to alter cement properties to meet downhole requirements. This study aims to investigate the impact of vermiculite particles on heavy weighted oil well cement. Base cement and vermiculite cement were prepared and cured under high pressure and high temperature. Viscosity was used to describe the slurry properties, while for the hardened cement samples, the elastic, petrophysical, and strength properties were described by the Poisson's ratio, permeability, and compressive strength, respectively. Moreover, the particles settling was measured by the density variation across the cement column. It was observed from the results that the performance of vermiculite cement is better than the base cement (without vermiculite). Vermiculite cement exhibits excellent properties compared to the base cement, which represents by lower viscosity (reduction of 8%), higher Poisson's ratio (an increase of 7%), lowere Young's modulus (a reduction of 9.4%), minimizing the density variation by 95%, reducing the cement permeability by 46% and improving the compressive strength by 24%.