Ape Tau wins the award for best research project
During the recent 7th National Rigid Polyurethane Foam Conference, held in Rome on 7th May 2026, ANPE President Massimiliano Stimamiglio presented the first prize to the research project “Performance Assessment and Post-Occupancy Monitoring of a Polyurethane-Based Building Envelope: The case of an energy-efficient kindergarten in Mediterranean climate”, developed by a joint team of researchers from SUPSI – University of Applied Sciences and Arts of Southern Switzerland, Università degli Studi dell’Aquila and Politecnico di Milano.
The research project, coordinated by Professor Marianna Rotilio and developed by researchers Leidy Guante Henriquez, Chiara Marchionni and Grazia Marrone, concerns the Ape Tau, the first Active House-certified building in the city of L’Aquila. Constructed immediately after the 2009 earthquake, the Ape Tau building represents an example of high-energy-performance emergency school architecture, constructed using industrialised dry-construction systems and polyurethane sandwich panels, provided at the time by Brianza Plastica.
The hyper-insulated dry structure ensures high resistance to earthquakes, fire and wind, as well as excellent thermal and acoustic insulation. The Ape Tau building hosts a nursery school: the structure covers an approximately 250 sqm area and it is made up of three wings resting on a thermally insulated and ventilated reinforced concrete plate. This nursery school was assembled very quickly, by fixing the polyurethane insulated metal panels to the hull-shaped metal structure, which optimised the energy efficiency of the ratio between internal volume and dispersant surfaces.
Through a reverse engineering approach, this research compares simulated post-construction performance in terms of Comfort, Energy and Environment with the actual performance, in order to develop guidelines and protocols for informed usage by final users. The analysis grounds on a monitoring campaign that has been active for approximately 21 months, comprising diagnostic surveys on the building envelope and continuous monitoring of the internal environmental quality through a system of detectors, together with measurements of temperature, humidity, lightness, VOCs, CO2 concentration and noise levels.
Following this recognition, the €1,000 prize will be allocated to the Brucaliffo Association to support the educational and recreational activities promoted within the Ape Tau nursery school, which today serves as a place for growth, socialising and inclusion for local children.