Alligin, which is part of the Greater Schiehallion Area, has been developed as a satellite oil field, with an investment of £230m
BP reports production of first oil from the Alligin field. (Credit: Pixabay/C Morrison)
BP and Royal Dutch Shell have drawn first oil from the Alligin field in Blocks 204/19a and 204/20a in P556 licence in the UK North Sea.
Alligin, which is part of the Greater Schiehallion Area, has been developed as a satellite oil field with an investment of £230m. The field is located 140km west of Shetland.
As per its development plan, two wells were drilled on the field, of which one is a production well and the other is a water injection well.
Both the wells have been tied back into the existing Schiehallion and Loyal subsea infrastructure and the Glen Lyon floating, production, storage, offload (FPSO) vessel located at the Schiehallion Field.
Also part of the development are new subsea infrastructure, which is made up of gas lift and water injection pipeline systems apart from a new controls umbilical.
BP, which is the operator of the field, had secured approval for its development from the UK’s Oil and Gas Authority (OGA) in October 2018. Both the partners in the offshore UK field hold 50% stake each.
The Alligin field will target production of 20 million barrels of oil equivalent
The company said that Alligin is a 20 million barrels of oil equivalent field, which was forecast originally to have a production of 12,000 barrels gross of oil equivalent a day at peak. The Alligin field is contained in a water depth of 475m.
According to BP, the performance of the Alligin project has been better than expected. The field is said to have reached 15,000 barrels gross of oil equivalent a day at peak since start-up in late December 2019.
BP North Sea regional president Ariel Flores said: “Achieving first oil from the Alligin field safely, under budget and ahead of schedule is testament to the performance of the project team and their agile approach to planning and execution.
“Alligin is part of BP’s advantaged oil strategy, a development with a shorter project cycle time with oil that is economic to produce and low risk to bring to market. Subsea tiebacks like this complement our major start-ups and help underpin our growing portfolio west of Shetland.”