Sure, but it was education and awareness that brought us electric cars on an industrial scale.
The economic reality of change is that there needs to be a driving force for it. But by just waiting to let the market correct for it in the case of resources you will make it nessesary to compete with the price of these resources untill they are depleted enough to be more expensive then the new tech.
That is not what you want...
You want to prevent the exhaustion of a resource.
And the market does not help us prevent that.
You want the most efficient use of resources, yes? Low price means more efficient. If you switch away from one resource while using it is still the more efficient option, you're acting against your stated desire. So, which would you rather have, a big, inefficient stockpile, or efficient use?
No, we need a
sustainable use of resources. That's the situation humanity is in at the moment.
Efficiency can in some cases be enough to achieve sustainability but not always.
No matter how efficiently you use the oil, it WILL run out.
So the actual solution is to use the natural resources efficiently and with care
while we look for an alternative way that is sustainable.