On 4 November 2026, ECOPILOT will host its first Stakeholder Workshop, bringing together industry representatives, SMEs, policymakers, researchers and experts in Life Cycle Assessment (LCA), Product Environmental Footprint (PEF) and Safe-and-Sustainable-by-Design (SSbD).
The online workshop will introduce ECOPILOT and its industrial use cases and provide stakeholders with an opportunity to directly inform the requirements and future development of the project’s PEF Copilot.
Coordinated by the Institute of Entrepreneurship Development (iED), with contributions from the ECOPILOT consortium, the workshop will help ensure that the project responds to real industrial challenges and user needs.
Why is stakeholder engagement important for ECOPILOT?
ECOPILOT is developing a conversational PEF Copilot designed to support safer and more sustainable decision-making in the furniture and mattress sectors.
To make the solution practical and relevant, the project needs input from the organisations and professionals who work directly with sustainability assessment, product design, environmental data and regulatory requirements.
The first ECOPILOT Stakeholder Workshop will therefore focus on collecting feedback about the project’s proposed industrial use cases and identifying stakeholder needs, barriers, data gaps and expectations.
Participants will also be invited to discuss important requirements for the future Copilot, including usability, transparency, trust, explainability and expected outputs.
Exploring ECOPILOT’s industrial use cases
During the workshop, participants will first receive an overview of the ECOPILOT objectives, expected impact and overall concept, as well as an explanation of how stakeholder feedback will contribute to the project’s ongoing work.
The consortium will then present ECOPILOT’s industrial use cases, focusing on:
- the industrial and sustainability challenges being addressed
- current product design and sustainability decisions
- existing data and methodological gaps
- the type of support expected from ECOPILOT
- key questions that require external stakeholder feedback
The aim is to move beyond a simple project presentation and create a two-way discussion around the practical challenges faced by industry.
Discussing LCA, PEF and Safe-and-Sustainable-by-Design challenges
A central part of the ECOPILOT Stakeholder Workshop will be an interactive consultation involving live polling and moderated discussion.
Participants will be invited to share their experience regarding current sustainability-assessment challenges, data availability and the practical adoption of LCA, PEF and SSbD methodologies.
The discussion will explore questions such as:
- What sustainability data are currently the most difficult to obtain?
- Which barriers prevent wider adoption of LCA, PEF and SSbD approaches?
- What information is needed to support credible sustainability decisions?
- What would make users trust an AI-assisted sustainability recommendation?
- How should uncertainty and confidence be communicated?
- Which outputs would be most useful for real product and material decisions?
These questions reflect the information needs identified by the ECOPILOT consortium for the development of the future Copilot.
Supporting a practical and trustworthy PEF Copilot
The workshop will also examine how users could interact with the future ECOPILOT solution.
Stakeholders will be asked to provide feedback on usability, transparency, explainability, confidence levels and workflow expectations, helping the consortium understand what organisations need from an AI-assisted tool supporting sustainability assessment.
Feedback collected during the workshop will support the ongoing work of WP1 and WP2, the further refinement of ECOPILOT’s industrial use cases, and the development of future Copilot functionalities.
Who should join the ECOPILOT Stakeholder Workshop?
The workshop is particularly relevant for professionals and organisations working in areas connected to sustainable materials, product development and environmental assessment.
ECOPILOT is seeking participation from SMEs and industrial organisations, policymakers and regulatory actors, LCA and PEF practitioners, SSbD experts, researchers and research organisations, standardisation actors, as well as other stakeholders connected to the project’s industrial use cases.
Their feedback will not only contribute to the first stages of ECOPILOT development but will also help establish a wider stakeholder community for future validation, training, dissemination and engagement activities.
ECOPILOT Stakeholder Workshop: Event Details
Date: 4 November 2026
Time: 11:00–13:00 CET
Format: Online
Focus: Industrial use cases, PEF, LCA, SSbD and stakeholder requirements for the ECOPILOT solution
Register now!
he first ECOPILOT Stakeholder Workshop represents an important step towards developing a solution that combines technological innovation with real industrial requirements.
By involving stakeholders from the beginning, ECOPILOT aims to develop a PEF Copilot that is not only technically robust, but also practical, transparent, trustworthy and relevant to real sustainability and product-design decisions.