While I don't disagree that capitalism is at work. It is almost a given that the reduction in steel is due to auto manufactures and many other industries have m

While I don't disagree that capitalism is at work. It is almost a given that the reduction in steel is due to auto manufactures and many other industries have moved to aluminum or composite materials. Neither one of them offers a great environmental or energy savings over steel. Paper is most likely digitization which again just transfers the energy use into computing every time the document is viewed and is almost certainly a net negative in relation to energy consumption. Fertilizer I don't know but a half ass guess would be GMO's. As they are able to target traits that allow them to use less fertilizer and pesticides to produce the same amount of crop yield.