Abstract：Casing damage of steam injection wells is widespread in many oil fields of China. A numerical simulation method based on finite element theory is used to simulate casing stress under the earth stress and temperature load to study the mechanism of the casing damage. A two-step computing method is put forward. The first step provides the temperature and earth stress near the casting using the coarse-mesh finite element model；the second computation provides more accurate results using the fine-mesh finite element model. The simulation shows that casing slotting results in sharp stress concentration and the maximum Von Mises stress increases by 30%–50%. The simulation also shows that injecting temperature can greatly influence the stress field. For example，the maximum Von Mises stress increases by 26.5% when the injecting temperature is 200 ℃. The research results are very helpful to the casing protect in oil field by selecting suitable injecting temperature.
