On October 10th, the ARV project was showcased at the Sustainable Places Conference in Milan, as part of a workshop dedicated to a key challenge for EU projects: maximizing impact and outcomes in Positive Energy Districts and district-wide initiatives through active end-user involvement—including citizens, communities, and building occupants.

Within this framework, ARV featured alongside eight other Horizon Europe projects in a two-hour interactive session focused on peer learning and knowledge exchange between project representatives and the audience.

Marcello Curci, EU Project Manager at Habitech – Distretto Tecnologico Trentino (DTTN) and lead of the Trento demonstration case, presented the rationale behind ARV and the engagement strategy developed around the “Povo case study” in Trento — a residential building where a conventional renovation approach was integrated with a prefabricated retrofit kit, installed for the first time at full scale.

The workshop offered an opportunity to highlight how the building’s residents—elderly inhabitants from the Povo district—were actively involved in the monitoring campaign related to both the renovation works and the post-renovation indoor environmental quality. The presentation illustrated how qualitative research methods—including joint site visits, surveys, and interviews—can effectively complement quantitative data gathered through sensors and technical monitoring, thus enriching the overall understanding of building performance and user experience.