ENQUEST has announced plans to spend up to £500 million on its UK oil and gas assets next year as it moves towards bringing major projects into production.

The company said production between January and October was running 19.2 per cent ahead of last year at 25,567 barrels of oil equivalent per day (boepd).

That reflected strong production from existing UK hubs, such as the Thistle, Dons and Heather assets, as well as new sites in Malaysia and Tunisia.

It stuck to its production target for the year of between 25,000 and 30,000 boepd.

Amjad Bseisu, chief executive, said: "The growth in production to the end of October reflects continuing strong reservoir performance and top quartile production efficiency from our existing producing assets.

"It also reflects a substantial initial contribution from PM8/Seligi and Didon, our first producing oil fields outside the North Sea."

EnQuest, which has its headquarters in London but is a major employer in Aberdeen, said it remained on course to meet its revised target for first oil from the Alma/Galia field in the North Sea in the middle of next year.

The field, once known as Argyll, became the first to start production in UK waters when it was brought on stream in 1975.

Yesterday EnQuest said construction work on a floating production, storage and offloading unit (FPSO) is substantially complete with the commissioning also having begun.

It said five production wells are finished in the field and waiting on the FPSO to arrive while subsea infrastructure is also in place.

Meanwhile, its giant Kraken development west of Shetland is also said to be progressing on schedule and on budget.

EnQuest expects to have a drilling rig on the field during the third quarter of next year while it is also working on the conversion of an FPSO for Kraken.

Certain elements of the subsea infrastructure needed to have been completed.

A survey vessel has also completed work around the anchor location points needed for the FPSO.

Mr Bseisu said: "With Alma due onstream in mid-2015 and Kraken on schedule for first oil in 2017, EnQuest is set for substantial production growth from its UK hubs.

"Growth is also enhanced by production from our new businesses in South East Asia and North Africa, increasing the diversity of EnQuest's portfolio."

EnQuest confirmed it was offered eight licences as part of the recent North Sea licensing round.

Analysts suggested much of the investment EnQuest plans for the North Sea next year will go towards the Kraken field, which is expected to start producing oil in 2017. While the company admitted budgets for capital spending are still being finalised it expects to spend between £440m and £500m on its UK assets. Mr Bseisu said Enquest will firm up its investment plans when it publishes its annual results. He added: "The oil and gas industry has been adjusting its plans for the impact of recent decreases in oil prices and in associated service costs."

EnQuest also announced plans to commence drilling operations on the Ythan field, which lies adjacent to its current producing Dons asset, before the end of this year with a view to producing first oil from the field by the middle of 2015. A second production well in the Alba field came on stream last month while investments in the Thistle and Kittiwake assets also led to production increases in the period.