Healthy Habitats Living Lab (H2LLab) has been formally accepted as a member of the European Network of Living Labs (ENoLL), following approval by the ENoLL General Assembly.
H2LLab is joining the network as an Adherent Member, marking an important step in the further development and international recognition of our work in participatory environmental health, citizen science, urban sustainability and real-life experimentation.
The external evaluation confirmed H2LLab’s maturity as a Living Lab and recognised the strength of its scientific foundation, interdisciplinary team, stakeholder network and user-centred approach. H2LLab achieved an overall evaluation score of 80.91% and scored above the average of Living Labs assessed by ENoLL since 2024 across every evaluated chapter and criterion.
The evaluation highlighted H2LLab’s strongest areas as operations and user engagement. Particular recognition was given to the way citizens, students, policymakers, schools, civil society organisations and industry partners are involved throughout the full innovation process—from identifying challenges and co-designing research to collecting data, interpreting results and validating outcomes in real-life settings.
The report also identified several H2LLab practices as examples that could be transferred to other Living Labs, including:
- participatory environmental monitoring built around citizen science;
- user involvement across the full innovation lifecycle;
- the use of a theory-of-change framework to evaluate participatory processes;
- the direct connection of advanced analytical infrastructure with real-life fieldwork.
H2LLab was described as one of the strongest applications evaluated in the 2026 round, with user-centricity receiving the highest individual score of 90%. The assessment also recognised the value of projects and tools such as the Urban Cycling Lab, URBANOME, MultiPart, GreenPaths and Primerjalnik in connecting scientific research with communities, public authorities and real-world decision-making.
Membership in ENoLL will provide new opportunities for international collaboration, knowledge exchange, capacity building and participation in thematic working groups with Living Labs across Europe. It will also support the continued formalisation and long-term development of H2LLab within the Jožef Stefan Institute.
The evaluation report provided constructive recommendations for the next phase of development, including strengthening independent governance, establishing Living Lab-specific impact indicators, developing a longitudinal participant panel, expanding the service portfolio and further strengthening H2LLab’s own communication presence.
We are proud to join the ENoLL community and look forward to contributing our experience in citizen science, environmental monitoring, participatory modelling and urban environmental health to the wider European Living Lab network.
