Siccar Point Energy has kicked off drilling at its Lyon prospect in the West of Shetland.

The company confirmed on Friday that the well had been spudded by the Ocean GreatWhite semisubmersible.

It follows news earlier this week that drilling had wrapped up at the nearby Blackrock prospect, 86miles north-west of Shetland, with results that Siccar described as “very encouraging”.

The Lyon prospect is thought to contain 1-3 trillion cubic feet of recoverable gas.

Siccar Point bought 100% of the licence containing Lyon from Austrian firm OMV in January 2017.

It then sold 66.6% of the asset to Ineos in December, but retained the operatorship.

Lyon was initially meant to be drilled last year with the West Hercules rig, however this was delayed to 2019 due to bad weather.