Oil major BP has announced early production from the Alligin field located in the west of Shetland region, offshore the UK.

BP received the UK authorities' nod to proceed with development of the Alligin field back in October 2018. The field is located 140 kilometers west of Shetland in a water depth of 475 meters.

Alligin forms part of the Greater Schiehallion Area and has been developed as a two-well subsea tieback into the existing Schiehallion and Loyal subsea infrastructure and the Glen Lyon floating, production, storage, offload (FPSO) vessel, BP said on Tuesday.

It is a 20 million barrels of oil equivalent field, which was originally forecast to produce 12,000 barrels gross of oil equivalent a day at peak.

The project's performance has been better than expected, however, reaching 15,000 barrels gross of oil equivalent a day at peak since start-up in late December, according to BP.

The development has included new subsea infrastructure, consisting of gas lift and water injection pipeline systems, and a new controls umbilical.

BP North Sea Regional President, Ariel Flores, said: “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.”

BP owns a 50 percent stake in the Alligin field, with its partner Shell holding the other 50 percent. The field is part of a series of infrastructure-led subsea tieback developments in the North Sea, accessing new production from fields located near to established producing infrastructure.