Mumbai: Essar Oil would raise a fresh debt of up to $5 billion to finance its $6 billion refinery expansion programme at Vadinar and for acquisition of oil and gas blocks.

"We are scanning and evaluating E&P opportunities globally (for acquisition)," Essar Oil's managing director Naresh Nayyar said.

The Ruias-promoted company is looking for possible acquisitions in the Middle East, Southeast Asia, Central Asia, Africa, China, Australia, South America, Eastern Europe, Russia and the Indian sub-continent.

Essar Oil has targeted a refining capacity of one million barrel per day (bpd) and the company is confident to reach the target in the next three-four years, he said.

''With the expansion at Vadinar, our capacity will go up to 700,000 bpd. The rest, we are targeting to achieve through acquisition of assets overseas," he said.

The current capacity of Essar's Vadinar refinery is 10.5 mmtpa. It intends to increase it to 34 mmtpa.

Essar Oil plans to fund the expansion through a mix of debt and equity in a ratio of 1.3 :1, Nayyar said.

"We plan to raise a fresh debt of up to $5 million to fund the expansion. The fund would be raised through external commercial borrowing and rupee loans," he said.

The company has already received in-principle commitment from lenders for up to $4.3-billion, he added.