Abstract The application of salt for primary cementing in Western Canada has been restricted largely to salt cavern storage wells and to the development of potash reserves in south-central Saskatchewan. The value of salt cement blendsin cementing through fresh water sensitive formations has recently broughtabout wide usage of this technique in certain areas of the United States, andthere is good reason to believe that there are several areas in Canada wherethe success of primary cementing could be improved by the use of saltcements. There has been considerable work done on the applicability of salt cement, with emphasis on improved cement-formation bonding and the minimization offormation deterioration by water contact. Field results have shown that saltcements have improved the success of primary and squeeze cementing jobs. Laboratory work has been done to evaluate the change in slurry properties with the addition of varying concentrations of salt to commonly used cementing blends. Introduction The use of salt cements in Canada has been quite limited and, as a result, the primary purpose of the information presented here is to illustrate theadvantage of salt for primary cementing of oil and gas wells where the formations encountered contain fresh water sensitive clays and shales. The first known use of salt cements in Western Canada occurred within thepast ten years. Initially, salt cements came into use because of the failure toset fresh water cement abandonment plugs in the salt and potash zonesencountered in potash test holes. Earlier experience in the U.S.A. proved that a good cement-formation bond through a salt section could only be achieved byusing a salt cement. Figure 1 illustrates the bonding of cement to rocksalt. The illustration shows how a fresh water slurry will dissolve a portionof the salt, with the result that there is no bond between the salt and cement, while the saturated salt slurry does not dissolve any portion of the salt, resulting in good contact and bonding between the salt and the cement. Operators in Saskatchewan found that casing could be cemented successfully in salt cavern gas storage wells with a sodium chloride slurry; more recentwork has employed a sodium chloride and potassium chloride (potash) saturated slurry (1). Later, casing was set into the potash for a solution mining project, and again salt cements were used to obtain a good primary cement job.