From extreme density to sustainability and grid intelligence, the foundation is being laid.
Europe is racing to scale up its AI capabilities, and Belgium is determined to secure its place at the table. With government support behind the bid to host one of the EU’s first AI Factories, the ambition is clear. But making this ambition real requires more than policy, it requires infrastructure designed for a new technological era.
Modern AI workloads, driven by GPUs such as NVIDIA’s B200 and GB200, demand far higher rack densities than traditional datacenters were ever built to handle. Requirements are rapidly moving from the 6–12 kW per rack “legacy standard” toward 60 kW configurations today, and liquid-cooled environments exceeding 150 kW per rack tomorrow. In some cases, experimental designs are already approaching 400 kW. For many facilities, retrofitting will no longer suffice.
The New Baseline: Verified High-Density
Across Europe, only a handful of sites are proving that such densities can be achieved in practice. At Kevlinx’ Brussels campus, extensive computational fluid dynamics (CFD) studies, airflow modelling, and design validation have already demonstrated that 60 kW per rack can be delivered with the path to 150 kW+ liquid-cooled systems already laid out for the next wave of deployments.
“This isn’t just an engineering milestone; it marks the shift from theory to operational readiness,” says Charlie Bater, Global Datacenter Director at Black & White Engineering. “High-density at this level is no longer a future scenario, it’s available for deployment.”
For Belgium, this represents more than a technical achievement. It’s proof that AI infrastructure can be hosted locally, at scale, with performance that rivals international hubs.
Beyond Compliance: Sustainability as Obligation
As density increases, so too does the responsibility to design sustainably. Meeting the requirements of the European Energy Efficiency Directive is a starting point, but true AI Factories must go further.
Technologies such as ABB’s HiPerGuard MV UPS illustrate what this future looks like: 97.83% certified efficiency, a 15-year lifecycle, and independently verified data on CO₂ emissions and material composition. Instead of marketing claims, lifecycle assessments are becoming the new currency of trust.
“Sustainable infrastructure is no longer a nice-to-have, it’s an obligation,” says Freek Van Alphen Head Data Center Services EMEA at ABB. “The proof now lies in quantified data-efficiency, emissions, reliability that organizations can validate for themselves.”
Waste heat reuse, enabled by liquid cooling, is another crucial dimension. Heat captured from renewable-powered workloads can be redirected to district heating and cooling projects, creating tangible community benefits alongside digital growth.
Grid Intelligence: The Next Differentiator
Delivering 60 to 150 kW per rack also places enormous pressure on national power systems. That is why grid-aware infrastructure, such as the systems now being deployed at Kevlinx’ first AI-ready campus, is emerging as the next differentiator. Rather than operating in isolation, tomorrow’s AI Factories will interact dynamically with the grid, balancing supply and demand in real time and contributing to long-term energy planning.
Such integration ensures that datacenters are not only consumers of power but active participants in the wider energy ecosystem.
Laying the Foundation for Belgium’s AI Ambitions
Belgium’s aspiration to become an AI hub is not simply a matter of chips and servers. It is about proving that the country can host world-class infrastructure: technically advanced, environmentally responsible, and aligned with national energy strategies.
This isn’t just about cooling and kilowatts.
Eric Lisica, COO Kevlinx
“This isn’t just about cooling and kilowatts,” says Eric Lisica, COO of Kevlinx. “It’s about building infrastructure worthy of Europe’s AI ambitions, dense enough to compete globally, sustainable enough to endure, and intelligent enough to integrate with the grid.” With 60 kW per rack validated today and a scalable roadmap to 150 kW+ in the next phases, the foundation for Belgium’s AI Factory is already being laid. The challenge now is to ensure that technology, policy, and market adoption move in lockstep, so ambition becomes reality.
This is a contributed article written by Linne Voets, Strategic Marketing Manager at Kevlinx. Click here for more information about the company.