Depends on the cryptocurrency in question, but yes, a cryptocurrency working under a Proof-of-Work scheme like bitcoin, will use more energy than credit card systems. I'm not sure it'll ever be possible to outperform centralized, digital systems on an energy usage level. What I was critical of, was the comparison to physical money. Energy usage isn't really that important a metric for payment systems though, price is probably more relevant, where some innovations in cryptocurrency might come to be competitive with credit cards.