The global (re)insurance industry has been told it needs to engage with the soaring numbers of data centre projects if it is to meet the demand for cover and drive greater resilience.

The call came as the Swiss Re Institute has today published its latest sigma insights paper, “Insuring AI: data centre value accumulation risks” which sought to highlight the risks and the response from underwriters.

It added with the global data centre sector set to expand at a 14% CAGR through 2030, the evolution of data centres from relatively simple sites to highly engineered industrial systems is changing the nature of the underlying exposure.

New exposure drivers are meeting technology which is moving faster than loss experience and safety codes, while empirical loss data for next generation hyperscale/AI facilities remains limited. Swiss Re Institute modelling finds that more than a quarter of the US data centre capacity may be in locations experiencing ≥3 large-hail days per year. In addition, over 40% of capacity could also sit in significant-to-very-high tornado-day zones.

This  publication explored this fast-evolving risk landscape and how its insurance implications are becoming more material.

Key takeaways include:

• Insurance demand is rising sharply, alongside pressure for larger limits. Global insurance premium tied to data centres is currently estimated at $10.6 billion and projected to rise to $24.2 billion by 2030, with financing requirements driving demand for very large single-site insurance towers.
• Property loss severity could increase as newer facilities introduce different fire exposures. The spread of lithium-ion battery backup units within server racks adds an ignition source inside data processing rooms that did not previously exist, with implications for both fire frequency and loss intensity.
• Liquid cooling is creating a meaningful loss driver. As operators move toward direct-to-chip liquid cooling, liquid-related losses are becoming more material: they represented nearly 24% of historical data-centre loss costs, including 9.3% from sprinkler leakage and 10% from escaped liquids.
• Nat cat accumulation is becoming harder to manage. Large data-centre clusters are forming in exposed regions, increasing the possibility that a single hail, tornado or wind event could generate losses across multiple buildings, campuses and programmes at once.
• Business interruption and portfolio aggregation risk are growing. Large sites can involve multiple tenants, shared critical systems and separate insurance placements across buildings, equipment and power infrastructure — creating the potential for one event to trigger multiple concurrent BI and property claims.

Jimmy Keime, head engineering & nuclear, Swiss Re explained: “This transformation marks a structural shift for the re/insurance industry. As data centres become increasingly concentrated, energy-dependent and systemically critical, they face an evolving spectrum of exposures. For the (re)insurance industry, that means moving beyond passive risk transfer to actively enabling resilience – engaging earlier in design, siting and power decisions, while also requiring greater transparency on the underlying risk.”