Immelt also said that the United States should be moving quickly to permit more nuclear power plants and pursue the development of plants that burn coal more cleanly by socking away harmful carbon dioxide emissions underground.

GE, Dow, Duke Energy Corp, environmental groups and other U.S. utilities and manufacturers are members of the U.S. Climate Action Partnership (USCAP), which has called for a market-based emissions trading system and a nationwide limit on carbon dioxide emissions that would lead to reductions of 10 percent to 30 percent over the next 15 years.

At the conference, Immelt defended GE's membership in USCAP, saying he wanted to have a role in determining environmental legislation rather than have it "pushed down my throat" down the road.

Climate change legislation has been moving more quickly in Europe. The European Union aims to slash greenhouse gas emissions by 20 percent by 2020 and increase the share of wind, solar, hydro and wave power and biofuels in their energy mix by the same date. Unlike the United States, the EU also has a carbon emissions trading system.

Most immediately, U.S. companies are particularly concerned with the failure of Congress to extend tax credits for renewable energy. Those tax credits, which expire later this year, are critical to offsetting the cost of developing renewable energy projects and to making them competitive with energy from fossil fuels.

Business leaders also said government must fund research and development of clean energy sources and technologies.

"I don't want to invest in R&D. My job is to work with commercialization" said John Doerr, a partner with venture capital firm Kleiner Perkins Caufield and Byers.