> limiting energy use is vital to avoid climate catastrophe.
This is what I have issue with. Energy use benefits humanity. Full stop.
If you said civilization needs bananas to survive and flourish, then some good samaritan came along and said "I will always buy any leftover bananas you can't sell no matter where or when you grow them", you would get many more banana farms, people experimenting with new banana growing/harvesting technology, etc. It's an undeniable benefit if your goal is to produce more bananas.
I'll try a simple analogy: imagine that your goal is to consume as much corn as possible. (A silly goal for many reasons, but that's a different discussion.) You have all of the corn that you've grown to eat, and then there's the seed corn you would need to plant in order to eat more corn in the future. If you decide to eat the seed corn as well, you will eat more corn in the immediate future, and then much less corn after that. Clearly limits to consumption are sometimes necessary in order to maximize consumption over the long term, even if you grant the premise that maximizing consumption is desirable.
Terrible analogy. Energy production requires large upfront investments in infrastructure. There is nothing analogous to seed in energy. There are only farms and corn that expires extremely quickly and is hard to transport.
This is what I have issue with. Energy use benefits humanity. Full stop.
If you said civilization needs bananas to survive and flourish, then some good samaritan came along and said "I will always buy any leftover bananas you can't sell no matter where or when you grow them", you would get many more banana farms, people experimenting with new banana growing/harvesting technology, etc. It's an undeniable benefit if your goal is to produce more bananas.