Chancellor Friedrich Merz's government faces a March 25 deadline to deliver a policy framework for how the EU's largest economy will deliver on legally binding climate pledges.

The leaked draft notes that Germany -- long a green energy champion -- is now projected to fall just short of hitting a 2030 target of reducing greenhouse gas emissions by 65 percent compared to 1990 levels.

Reaching that target remains "fundamentally achievable," says the draft, but an advisory panel of climate experts cited in the plan was less optimistic, finding that the target is "probably not going to be achieved".

Environmental groups which have looked at the details agreed, after the plan was also reported on by several German media outlets.

Germany's climate targets "cannot be achieved with the measures proposed" in the draft plan, the head of the group Environmental Action Germany (DUH), Sascha Mueller-Kraener, told AFP.

The draft plan also says that "the goal of net greenhouse gas neutrality by 2045 remains at risk of not being achieved".

"With the current climate policy instruments and the assumed framework conditions, it is not foreseeable that the transformation to greenhouse gas neutrality will be successful in all sectors," it reads.

The draft, prepared by the environment ministry and dated to late January, includes a range of policy proposals to help cut emissions, from subsidies for energy efficient building renovations to more investment in public transport.

But critics quickly noted that the draft does not account for other moves being pushed by Merz's coalition government, including a loosening of EU-wide car emission rules and an expected rollback of building energy efficiency mandates.

An environment ministry spokesman said details of the action plan are still being negotiated and that "we do not comment on unfinished drafts".

He added that the government remains committed to achieving Germany's legally mandated climate targets.