Same Roof, 10 Different Gases: What a Data Center Is Quietly Holding
Data centers’ reliability equipment – UPS batteries, refrigerants, and generators – creates hidden gas hazards that cause both safety incidents and costly outages.
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Data centers contain hidden gas hazards from essential equipment like UPS batteries, refrigerants, generators, and suppression systems, which can cause both safety incidents and costly outages. UPS batteries can release hydrogen or toxic gases, refrigerants can leak and settle in low areas, generators produce carbon monoxide and nitrogen dioxide, and other systems introduce additional chemical risks, all contained within sealed buildings designed to prevent dissipation. Power and cooling failures are the leading causes of significant data center outages, with cooling alone responsible for 19 percent of outages and more than half of serious incidents costing over $100,000. Data center capacity is growing rapidly while these gas hazards remain, and safety depends on consolidating information about what chemicals are present, maintaining accessible gas detectors, and treating different rooms according to their specific hazards rather than assuming uniform safety across the building.
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