**An Ecolabel for the World Heritage Brand? Developing a Climate Communication Recognition Scheme for Heritage Sites**

### **Kathryn Lafrenz Samuels 1,\* and Ellen J. Platts 1**

Department of Anthropology, University of Maryland, College Park, MD 20742, USA; ejplatts@terpmail.umd.edu

**\*** Correspondence: lafrenzs@umd.edu

Received: 30 January 2020; Accepted: 3 March 2020; Published: 5 March 2020

**Abstract:** This study develops a climate communication recognition scheme (CCRS) for United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) World Heritage Sites (WHS), in order to explore the communicative power of heritage to mobilize stakeholders around climate change. We present this scheme with the aim to influence site managemen<sup>t</sup> and tourist decision-making by increasing climate awareness at heritage sites and among visitors and encouraging the incorporation of carbon managemen<sup>t</sup> into heritage site management. Given the deficits and dysfunction in international governance for climate mitigation and inspired by transnational environmental governance tools such as ecolabels and environmental product information schemes, we o ffer "climate communication recognition schemes" as a corollary tool for transnational climate governance and communication. We assess and develop four dimensions for the CCRS, featuring 50 WHS: carbon footprint analysis, narrative potential, sustainability practices, and the impacts of climate change on heritage resources. In our development of a CCRS, this study builds on the "branding" value and recognition of UNESCO World Heritage, set against the backdrop of increasing tourism—including the projected doubling of international air travel in the next 15–20 years—and the implications of this growth for climate change. The CCRS, titled *Climate Footprints of Heritage Tourism*, is available online as an ArcGIS StoryMap.

**Keywords:** climate change; climate communication; mitigation; adaptation; World Heritage; heritage tourism; carbon footprint; carbon management; ecolabel; environmental product information scheme; transnational governance
