Today: Eire is a test case for countries seeking AI investment without risking outages or higher bills for citizens; the growing popularity of plug-in solar; Americans are keeping their cars longer than ever.

Welcome back: Big tech built so many data centers in Ireland that the sector uses a fifth of the country’s electricity—more than all of Ireland’s urban homes put together. For much of the past three years, the country barred new data centers to ensure its electricity grid could cope.

Now, Ireland is trying a new approach: B.Y.O.P., or Bring Your Own Power. New data centers and expansions of existing facilities are welcome, but must have their own power plants on site or contracts for new, largely renewable sources of energy to be produced nearby. They can’t just grab juice from the grid, WSJ Pro Sustainable Business's Yusuf Khan reports.

Ireland’s policy is being seen as a leading indicator for how countries and regions can balance the need to attract the tidal wave of investment that comes with betting on AI, while also making sure residents don’t pay for the costs through either electricity blackouts or higher power prices.

Public backlash to data centers is growing. More Americans now say the energy-hungry facilities have more downsides than positives, according to the Pew Research Center, and 71% oppose having one built in their own area, according to a March Gallup survey.

• Arizona's largest utility proposed a 45% electricity-rate increase for data centers and 14.5% for residential customers. (WSJ)

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It sounds like a crackpot invention advertised on the back of an old comic book: DIY solar panels you plug into a standard wall outlet to pump electricity into your home. And yet they’re totally real, and more states are now saying they’re legal and safe to use. It’s called “plug-in solar,” aka “balcony solar,” because that’s where panels are often placed, writes Journal technology columnist Christopher Mims.

Residents of Utah and Maryland can now use it to combat skyrocketing utility bills, and seven more states—Colorado, Connecticut, Maine, New Hampshire, New York, Vermont and Virginia—have recently passed laws to make it possible, too. More than 20 other states are working on legalizing this technology, according to Bright Saver, a nonprofit that tracks and advocates for this technology.

While we typically draw power out of our outlets, they’re capable of receiving power as well. The safety concern is that, during an outage, this auxiliary electricity source could endanger electricians or utility workers. But the balcony solar products now being sold will shut off if they sense that the grid is down or the home’s main power is off.

America’s drivers are squeezing more miles out of their vehicles and eschewing new rides because of sticker shock, high interest rates and economic jitters. Others are hanging on to aging wheels simply because they can. Thanks to advancements in engineering, materials and safety technology, today’s cars last longer than vehicles of generations past.

The average vehicle on U.S. roads is about 13 years old, a historic high and a 10% increase from a decade ago, the Journal's Sharon Terlep reports.

While cars have steadily grown older over the last 15 years, the trend picked up after the Covid pandemic, when shuttered factories and supply-chain snarls drove up prices. The shift has accelerated in recent years as more car buyers balk at lofty new-vehicle prices, and many automakers grapple with fallout from America’s cooling on electric vehicles, which has cost companies tens of billions in lost investments and forced them to rethink their U.S. lineups.

• PepsiCo is using 35 driverless trucks on roads in Arizona, the first major U.S. consumer-goods company to use autonomous trucks at scale. (WSJ)

• TotalEnergies has capped fuel prices at its 3,300 gas stations in France, a unique move among Western oil companies amid the Iran war. (WSJ)
   
• The head of BP’s global gas and low-carbon energy business will leave the company later this year. (FT)
   
• An electric dirt bike that’s cheap, fast and rarely street legal has become the hottest thing in the two-wheel market. (WSJ)
   
• The number of companies disclosing to CDP fell in 2025, the first drop since the organization’s founding in 2001. (Trellis)
   
• Commonwealth Fusion Systems says five peer-reviewed papers validate the physics underpinning its commercial-scale power plant. (Bloomberg)
   
• Vermont aims to wean off fossil fuels faster than most of America, but large solar projects are facing resistance from locals. (Canary Media)
   
• Rules regulating “forever chemicals” travel with a product and aren’t tied to a manufacturer’s headquarters address. (Dow Jones Risk Journal)
   
• A Kentucky rancher ran a $170 million “ghost herd” Ponzi scheme, attracting investors with promises of profits from imaginary cows. (WSJ)

WSJ Pro Sustainable Business gives you an inside look at how companies are tackling sustainability. Send your comments to editor Perry Cleveland-Peck at perry.cleveland-peck@wsj.com. Follow the WSJ Pro Sustainable Business team on LinkedIn at perrycp, clara-hudson and yusuf_khan.