(Updates with details from report)

BERLIN, Dec 4 (Reuters) - Germany, the world's sixth largest emitter of greenhouse gases, will outline legislation this week on plans to reduce its emissions by 40 percent by 2020 compared with 1990 levels, according to a draft released on Tuesday.

Environment Minister Sigmar Gabriel is due to formally present the government's energy and climate programme on Wednesday after approval by the cabinet, including what laws will be needed to enable it to reach the ambitious target.

German reductions in CO2 have stagnated since the mid-1990s. Most of the 18 percent cut achieved since 1990 is due mainly to the collapse of the heavily polluting Communist East German industry that disappeared after unification.

The government plans up to 29 measures to reduce CO2.

They include a possible CO2 tax on trucks as well as other rules on traffic, tougher standards for new buildings and refurbishing requirements for existing buildings.

It also aims to raise energy and heating efficiency and to promote further expansion of renewable energy, doubling the proportion of renewables in national power output to 25 percent.

The programme will be designed to limit new burdens on consumers and private households, who in the long run will benefit from a reduction in energy use.

Greenpeace has criticised the German government for also giving its blessing to some 20 coal-burning power plants, needed to fill the void created by the phasing out of nuclear plants.

The environmental group has said that if all 24 planned power plants are built -- six are under construction -- there is no way the country can meet its target of cutting CO2 by 40 percent.

Government officials from across the world are meeting in Bali, Indonesia this week to try to forge a global plan to combat climate change before the Kyoto Protocol expires in 2012. (Reporting by Erik Kirschbaum and Sylvia Westall, editing by Tim Pearce)

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