This isn’t a new idea. In 1865 the economist William Stanley Jevons pointed out that increasing the efficiency of machines that burned coal would lead to more coal being burned, not less.

Making something more efficient makes it cheaper, unlocking new use cases and consumption by people who couldn’t afford it earlier. That’s what we call Jevons’ Paradox.

Jevons was worried that the UK would run out of coal entirely. This question, asked in 1865, is similar to the 20th century worry of Peak Oil.

> Are we wise in allowing the commerce of this country to rise beyond the point at which we can long maintain it?

Jevons, William Stanley. The Coal Question: An Inquiry Concerning the Progress of the Nation, and the Probable Exhaustion of Our Coal Mines. Macmillan and Co., 1865.