Almeida, Luiz Felippe Medeiros de; Castro, Jaime Tupiassú Pinho de (Advisor); Júnior, Eurípedes do Amaral Vargas (Co-Advisor). Thermomechanical modeling of annular pressure build up in salt formations. Rio de Janeiro, 2016. 90p. MSc. Dissertation -Departamento de Engenharia Mecânica, Pontifícia Universidade Católica do Rio de Janeiro.This dissertation presents a thermo-mechanical numerical modeling to investigate the influence of the presence of salt rock on annular pressure build-up (APB). The APB phenomenon is a result of thermal expansion of confined drilling fluid in the well annulus, induced by heat generated by the production of hydrocarbons at temperatures above the remainder of the well. The evaporite formations have a viscoelastic mechanical behavior, with continuous deformation at constant stress, known as creep. This salt behavior is not currently considered by simulators used by the oil industry for the design of wells, with respect to this pressure load from APB. The objective is achieved by developing a methodology for calculating the APB effect for wells with saline formations, using a numerical model built in ABAQUS software, using the finite element method. Several simulations were performed with different configurations of lithology, temperature and drilling fluids, to analyze the influence of the viscoelastic behavior of the salt rock on pressure growth in confined annuli. After analyzing the results, it was concluded that the rock salt may act as a relief for the pressure generated by thermal expansion of the confined drilling fluid in the well annulus. The stresses generated by the APB lead to creep strains that increase the well diameter and consequently the annular volume, accommodating part of the generated pressure increase.