The world is seeing more fires and electrical incidents in data centres than ever before, with the UK ranking second globally behind only the United States. 

That’s according to the Energy Incident Register, which has begun compiling incidents from publicly available reporting, and found that there were 92 incidents involving data centre power infrastructure worldwide between 2010 and October 2026. 

Of those, 52 involved fires or thermal events, while 17 were classified as major incidents. While that doesn’t sound like a particularly big number on a global scale, the more worrying sign is the direction of travel. That’s because there were reportedly only eight incidents in 2024, while there were 20 in 2025, with another 18 recorded so far in 2026. 

The United States accounts for the largest number, with 33 incidents, followed by the UK with 14. India and France each recorded five.

On the face of it, the figures raise questions about the reliability of the electrical infrastructure designed to keep data centres operational. But a closer examination of the data tells a more complicated story.

What do the UK figures actually show?

While the UK ranks second for recorded incidents, only two of its 14 entries occurred from 2024 onwards. One was recorded in 2024, none in 2025 and one in 2026. The remainder stretch back to 2010, including four incidents in 2016 and three in 2020.

The most recent UK incident occurred in January 2026, when a fire broke out in a data centre building in Blackwall, east London. According to the London Fire Brigade, eight fire engines and around 60 firefighters attended the incident, which was believed to have been caused by the failure of a lead-acid battery.

The fire was contained to a string of batteries, with no injuries or further damage to the building reported. 

The other recent UK entry concerns a May 2024 power failure at a privately operated data centre used by the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra).

That incident disrupted several government digital services, including the Automatic Licence Verification System used for border checks. The outage meant the system was unavailable for 85 hours and four minutes, although contingency arrangements meant there were no significant delays to border checks.

So, are failures becoming more common?

Well, while the Energy Incident Register is clear in the direction of travel on a global scale – it should be noted that the numbers may not show the complete story. That’s because while it contains incidents dating back to 2010, data centre power systems were only formally added to its scope on October 2, 2026. Much of the historical information has therefore been assembled retrospectively from publicly available sources.

Its methodology acknowledges that some incidents never enter the public record, while reporting standards vary between countries and English-language sources receive greater coverage.

Additionally, increased scrutiny on the data centre industry in recent years has led to a general uptick in interest in the sector. That is likely to filter down into more reporting of incidents that previously may have gone unnoticed. 

Indeed, the register itself warns against interpreting rising historical incident counts as evidence that the industry is becoming less safe – and there could be a good reason for this.

In its Annual Outage Analysis 2026, published in May, Uptime Institute found that outage frequency per site had declined for the fifth consecutive year, although it also noted that the pace of improvement was slowing. While that is measuring all outages, it’s certainly a more positive direction of travel for the industry compared to the Energy Incident Register’s reporting. 

Backup power remains a vulnerability

Although there are doubts on whether the register can accurately establish whether reliability is actually deteriorating, its findings offer some insight into the electrical equipment involved in reported incidents.

UPS systems and battery rooms feature in 22 incidents, making them the most frequently identified equipment category. Backup generators appear in 15 incidents, followed by switchgear and electrical rooms in 10. While there’s a bunch of records that are not attributed to any equipment, there is independent evidence from the Uptime Institute’s own research that showcases the vulnerability of a data centres’ power infrastructure. 

In fact, in that research it identified power as the leading cause of impactful outages, with UPS systems, transfer switches and generators among the principal failure points.

Uptime also found that major data centre fires have gradually increased in recent years, with lithium-ion UPS batteries contributing to that trend. However, it cautioned that some of the increase could also be attributed to the expansion of data centre infrastructure rather than a greater likelihood of failure.

So, are UK data centres becoming less reliable?

Well, based on the evidence that we have – it’s too early to say. While the Energy Incident Register has documented some genuine incidents, there doesn’t appear to be a clear increase in failures in recent years – at least not for the UK. 

Additionally, if we take that data alongside the Uptime Institute’s own research, we find that outage frequency per site has actually been on the decline. 

But that doesn’t mean the risks to the sector are diminishing – quite the opposite. As Britain’s data centre estate expands, the total number of incidents could increase even if individual facilities become more reliable.