FTSE 250 energy firm Premier Oil says it is on track to begin production at its Solan development west of Shetland late next year.
The oil field, key infrastructure for which is being built in Fife, is about 170 miles offshore and is believed to harbour up to 40 million barrels of oil.
Premier is ploughing £538m into developing out the field. The drilling of four wells two oil producers and two water injection boreholes began in late spring.
The firm, which revealed its half-year results yesterday, said initial drilling operations at Solan were expected to be completed by the summer of next year.
A subsea storage tank fabricated in Dubai is set to be despatched to Solan in the first quarter of the year to be placed alongside a massive 8,500-tonne subsea platform jacket being manufactured at BiFab’s yard at Methil. The heavy engineering firm has also been tasked with producing the main 3,500-tonne topside module essentially the above-water elements of a rig where staff live and work as part of a £147m contract which has brought 350 jobs to Fife.
“Construction of the topsides and jackets is progressing at Burntisland Fabrications in Fife to meet sail-away and installation by the Thialf Heerema vessel during the second quarter of 2014,” the firm said yesterday.
“Hook-up and commissioning will then be undertaken ahead of first oil scheduled for the fourth quarter of 2014.”
Aside from Solan, Premier said it had enjoyed exploration success at its Bonneville and Lacewing prospects in the North Sea in the first half of this year, while production was increasing at Huntington and Rochelle.
Premier also said it had made “considerable progress” on its operated Catcher project since the field development concept was agreed late last year.
The update on North Sea activity came as Premier which is headquartered in London and has interests in 11 countries globally revealed that sales in the first half of 2013 had increased to $757.8m, from $744.3m the year previous.
Pre-tax profits were $20m ahead year-on-year at $214.6m, having risen from $194.6m 12 months ago.
The company is targeting full-year production of 63,000 barrels of oil per day, but said its hopes of achieving that figure were dependent on how quickly production at Huntington ramped up in the second half of the year.
The firm plans to drill six wells during the remainder of the year, with operations scheduled in Indonesia and Kenya and at the Luno 11 prospect in Norway.
CEO Simon Lockett said: “We have had one of our most successful periods for exploration, with six discoveries from seven wells, material additions to the portfolio and significant maturation of high impact leads and prospects.”