To invest or not to invest?

That’s the question automakers could be asking themselves about emerging technologies as they batten down the hatches amid a global trade war and accompanying economic turmoil.

US manufacturers already have committed hundreds of billions of dollars to EVs, and billions into developing self-driving cars. Now, faced with the prospect of significant cost increases thanks to President Donald Trump’s tariffs, business leaders might look to cut spending on technologies that have yet to yield meaningful returns.

“If they can’t pass the entire amount onto the end customer, then the investment dollars both into autonomous [vehicles] in particular, the software-defined vehicles, and electrification, all becomes at risk,” C.J. Finn, PwC’s US automotive industry leader, told Tech Brew.

But that strategy could be risky, according to experts.

“It’s a double-edged sword,” Lenny LaRocca, US auto sector leader for KPMG, said. “Instead of cutting in areas like autonomous or software, they need to double down on that to keep their product competitive.”

Pressure’s on: The Trump administration’s tariffs, including a 25% duty on all vehicle imports, are leading to major cost increases for the notoriously low-margin auto industry.

Keep reading here.—JG

The city of Bowling Green, Kentucky, recently asked its citizens a big question: How would they like to see their area evolve over the next 25 years?

The nearly 4,000 online responses and more than 1 million votes collected over the course of a month were predictably broad. People weighed in on everything from healthcare and education to preserving historic buildings and adding a Dave & Buster’s outpost.

And in order to summarize, categorize, and understand this flood of feedback in a timely fashion, local leaders turned to an LLM-based tool called Sensemaker from Google’s Jigsaw division. A local strategy consultancy called Innovation Engine and the Computational Democracy Project also worked on the effort.

Jigsaw CEO Yasmin Green said the project could serve as a blueprint for how AI and digital tools can better facilitate productive civic conversations online.

“The magic formula that Bowling Green has brought to life is what’s possible when you give people open-ended prompts and use AI to make sense of what they want,” Green said.

Keep reading here.—PK

Despite AI’s hefty carbon emissions, a new report from the International Energy Agency (IEA) took a more optimistic outlook on how AI will affect the climate crisis—and even claimed that “concerns that AI could accelerate climate change appear overstated.”

The report, which focuses on AI’s energy usage, underscored how under-equipped the electrical grid is for incoming data centers and provided recommendations for how the large amount of energy they consume could be mitigated.

One of the recommendations focused on where data centers are located: Almost half of US data centers are in “five regional clusters,” so the IEA suggested that new data centers be built “in areas of high power and grid availability.” Plus, like a recent study from Duke University, the IEA recommended that data centers operate using on-site generators and do so “more flexibly.”

And the stakes are high: “If the electricity sector does not step up,” the report said, “there is a risk that meeting data center load growth could entail trade-offs with other goals such as electrification, manufacturing growth, or affordability,” a warning other energy authorities have also sounded in recent months.

The report was, however, more reassuring about the effects AI will have on the environment.

Keep reading here.—TC

It’s electric—and not just the company name. On May 29, join us in New York or online to hear from Tiya Gordon, cofounder and COO of it’s electric, as she shares how curbside charging and community-focused solutions are powering the EV movement. Plus, hear from leaders shaping the future of transportation at Rivian, Mercedes-Benz, Waabi, and more.