COP 30 – Heritage and Resilience: Safeguarding Culture and Community in a Changing Climate 

14 November 2025, 11.00-12.00, Thailand pavillion, Blue zone

Participating Organizations: Architecture 2030, World Monuments Fund, ICOMOS, Thai delegat

Session Description: 

While global discussions on climate mitigation often focus on technology and infrastructure, cultural heritage offers a parallel pathway for transformation—one rooted in community, identity, and lived experience. Heritage embodies systems of knowledge, design, and stewardship that have long supported sustainable ways of living. As societies pursue energy transitions and systemic decarbonization, these cultural resources can inform more equitable and locally grounded mitigation and adaptation strategies.

Heritage and Resilience: Safeguarding Culture and Community in a Changing Climate explores how cultural heritage—both tangible and intangible—can strengthen resilience while contributing to just and inclusive climate transitions. The session brings together voices from heritage conservation, academia, and community practice to share examples of how traditional knowledge, local craftsmanship, and place-based practices intersect with modern sustainability and energy goals.

By recognizing heritage as both a source of wisdom and innovation, the discussion highlights how preserving culture can help reimagine climate solutions that honor the past while shaping a resilient, low-carbon future.

Speakers:

Welcome and moderation – Lori Ferris, Architecture2030, Climate Heritage Network

Ave Paulus, ICOMOS, ICOMOS Activities and Heritage Adapts Campaign

Meredith Wiggins, WMF, Rehabilitation of traditional water systems for urban resilience and water security

Kotchakorn Voraakhom, UNESCO Juror. Thailand Ayutthaya example

Billie Faircloth, CHN/Cornell Atkinson