Amid a wave of sump pumps, backwater valves and other methods designed to keep home basements dry comes a new, simple way to mitigate flood risk — an e-sensor. George Tsintzouras, CEO and co-founder of Canadian water tech company Alert Labs, became interested in creating such devices based on a bad experience he remembers as a property owner. “The reason why we started the company is that we actually owned properties that ended up with floods and seeing water damage in them — things that were absolutely preventable,” Tsintzouras told Canadian Underwriter Friday.