Risk Management in Data Centers with EVA
1. Introduction: Data Center Fires — A “Billion-Dollar” Threat to Business Continuity 🥵
Recent data center fires have gone beyond physical damage, leading to massive financial liabilities due to service disruptions.
👉 SK C&C Pangyo Data Center Fire (2022): A fire originating in a lithium-ion UPS battery room caused major service outages, including Kakao, with estimated damages reaching trillions of KRW.
👉 OVHcloud Fire in France (2021): Triggered by UPS power equipment, this incident resulted in approximately €105M in total damages, with €58M covered by insurance—significantly increasing insurer exposure.
These large-scale incidents highlight that modern AI-era data centers carry risks that can no longer be controlled with traditional physical security measures alone.
😲 2. Data Center Insurance Structure and the Surge in AI GPU Center Premiums
Data center insurance is typically structured as a bundled package including:
- Property (buildings and servers)
- Business Interruption
- Cyber Liability
- General Liability
👉 Premium Rates Based on Asset Value Property insurance premiums usually range from 0.2% to 0.5% of total asset value. However, AI data centers are now facing rapidly increasing premiums due to elevated risk classifications.
👉 Risks of High-Density Servers AI GPU clusters have significantly higher power density compared to traditional servers, directly increasing fire risk.
| Server Type | Power Consumption per Rack | Key Risk Factors |
|---|---|---|
| Traditional Servers | 5 – 10 kW | Standard cooling and power management |
| High-Performance Computing | 15 – 25 kW | Increased thermal management requirements |
| GPU Clusters | 40 – 120 kW | Cable overheating, PDU overload, electrical arcs |
😎 3. Key Underwriting Checklist from Insurers
Global insurance brokers (Aon, Marsh, FM Global, etc.) evaluate risk based not on facility size, but on technical measures that reduce incident probability. EVA provides strong advantages across these evaluation criteria.
👉 Power Infrastructure Risks
Current Status: 40–50% of data center fires originate from electrical systems. Lithium-ion battery thermal runaway is a major driver of rising premiums.
🌈 EVA’s Role: Detects minute temperature variations and thermal anomalies at the battery cell level in real time, significantly reducing lithium battery risks.
👉 Advanced Fire Detection and Suppression Systems
Current Status: Early smoke detection and gas-based suppression systems are top underwriting priorities.
🌈 EVA’s Role: AI-powered visual intelligence enables instant detection of flames and smoke, reducing detection time to seconds.
👉 Operational Risk (Human Error)
Current Status: Insurers heavily assess 24/7 monitoring systems and thermal inspection practices.
🌈 EVA’s Role: Transforms manual, human-dependent inspections into automated AI-driven monitoring.
❣️ 4. Economic Impact of EVA Adoption: A Risk Engineering Approach
The insurance market is shifting from post-incident compensation to proactive risk engineering—reducing the likelihood of future incidents. AI safety solutions like EVA create a win-win structure for both insurers and policyholders.
👉 Direct Insurance Premium Reduction (15%–30%) Well-implemented risk management systems can lead to premium reductions of 15% to 30%. For data centers worth hundreds of billions of KRW, this translates into direct financial benefits that exceed the cost of deploying the solution.
👉 Five Core Risk Control Points EVA addresses the key underwriting factors that directly impact insurance premiums:
- Continuous UPS battery monitoring: Early detection of thermal runaway
- High power density 대응: Focused monitoring of cable and PDU overheating in AI GPU environments
- Intelligent fire detection: Ultra-fast alerts based on visual data
- 24/7 uninterrupted monitoring: Detection of unsafe behavior and human error
- Faster incident response: Reduced time from alert to action
🥰 5. AI Safety Systems Define Data Center Business Continuity
From a data center operator’s perspective, EVA is not just a “security CCTV system.”
- Financial Value: Reduces insurance premiums and prevents large-scale business interruption losses
- Operational Value: Establishes standards for managing power and fire risks in high-density AI environments
- Reputational Value: Strengthens brand trust as a “safe data center” validated by strict insurance assessments
Through a virtuous cycle of AI Safety System → Risk Reduction → Insurance Discount, data centers can achieve both maximum safety and economic efficiency.