Failure of production tubing in the oil & gas industry has become alarmingly more frequent in recent years
in spite of the increased use of corrosion-resistant-alloy (CRA) materials. The majority of the recent
failures have occurred from the outside (annulus side) and been attributed to Environmentally Assisted
Cracking (EAC) — hence, best described as Annular EAC (AEAC). Examination of these failures points
to a serious incompatibility of the production tubing metallurgy with the packer fluid under stress. To solve
this problem, a research alliance of the co-authors to examine the compatibility of a wide spectrum of
completion fluids with various martensitic stainless steel metallurgies was established.