The Impact of Globalization on Renewable Energy Development in the Countries along the Belt and Road Based on the Moderating Effect of the Digital Economy

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

-The title should be changed to reflect more clearly the contribution of the study. Please revise the Conclusion in the abstract to avoid overly casual language.

-- In the introduction, you need to connect the state of the art to your paper goals. Please follow the literature review by a clear and concise state of the art analysis. This should clearly show the knowledge gaps identified and link them to your paper goals. Please reason both the novelty and the relevance of your paper goals. Clearly discuss what the previous studies that you are referring to. What are the Research Gaps/Contributions? Please note that the paper may not be considered further without a clear research gap and novelty of the study. In the introduction, clearly define, sustainability. Sustainability in the Circular Economy: Insights and Dynamics of Designing Circular Business Models, Applied Sciences 12, no. 3: 1521. https://doi.org/10.3390/app12031521

"China’s Belt and Road Initiative: A global model for an evolving approach to sustainable regional development." Sustainability 10, no. 11 (2018): 4234.

-In the Introduction, 2nd paragraph must support a practical example of which support the problem descriptions. A potential suggestion to the author/s is to support the importance of a title with some practical examples. However, it seems that too many things are bundled together, such that the logic and results are not very clear or convincing.

-There is no flow in the text. It partly depends on the lack of proofreading but also on the fact that many statements and claims are made without being followed up by a clear and logical discussion. It is especially problematic in the Introduction that brings up a number of findings from different areas without linking them together.

-The discussion needs to be more elaborate and the author should also compare it with previous research in this area. What are the main benefits of this study? The same goes for recommendations and future research.

- The conclusion is very weak. - Please make sure your conclusions' section underscores the scientific value-added of your paper, and/or the applicability of your findings/results. Highlight the novelty of your study. In addition to summarizing the actions taken and results, please strengthen the explanation of their significance. It is recommended to use quantitative reasoning comparing with appropriate benchmarks, especially those stemming from previous work.

It should also be an extrapolation of the key findings from the research and not a summary. So, there should be conclusions around the background theory, data theory/analysis and, key outcomes. The authors should have included the following sub-sections within the conclusion section with more details: In the future research direction, link your future research direction in the context of digital economy.

Enabling Progress in Developing Economies: A Novel Hybrid Decision-Making Model for Green Technology Planning. Sustainability. 2022; 14(1):258. https://doi.org/10.3390/su14010258

* Implications to theory and practice should be clearly stated;

* Key lessons learnt;

* Limitations of this research;

Author Response

Please see the attachment.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 2 Report

This paper analyses the effect of globalization and the digital economy on renewable energy development in the Belt and Road (B&R) countries from 2001 to 2018. After going through the paper, I found some concerns, as listed below:

1. A concise and factual abstract is required to state briefly the purpose of the research, the principal results and the major conclusions. Add some of the most important quantitative results to the abstract. Focus on the advantages of the proposed method with respect to the obtained results.
2. Most of the ideas written were already described in many literatures. The Authors tried to compile it but lack of the enhancement of the interrelation analysis between the references. It is advised that the authors give a deeper analysis on how these ideas become more applicative strategies so that they can contribute to the next step of implementation.
3. The motivation of the paper is unclear, while it should be eye catching in order to make more sense. In this regard, a separate section on motivation and contribution should be included.
4. Major clarifications and explanations are needed make the contributions of the paper clearly stand out. There exist many works that are focusing on renewable energy integration considering different distributed means of generation, responsive loads, storage units, and in the presence of uncertainties. (such as  https://doi.org/10.3390/su131810382, https://doi.org/10.3390/pr9081468 and many more). The literature review should be updated to help readers better understand the subject matter and novelty aspects of this work compared to the recently published works.
5. I would like to see more discussion of the literature so that I can clearly identify the article relates to competing ideas.
6. The conclusion is a bit general or it lacks distinction. Please refine this further to be more thought-provoking.
7. There are several grammatical mistakes. Please work close to a native English speaker to refine the language of this paper.

Author Response

Please see the attachment.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 3 Report

 

I read this paper with my interest. The following are my observations.

The objective/gap for this research is not mentioned properly. The study's primary goals should be clearly outlined. The opening should highlight the issue's and or problem's extent and relevance.

The authors used the digital economy as moderating variable. The digital economy variable consists of different proxies. Please clearly revise the index system, and the table# 1 attributes why they all have a positive sign.

In the result section, the author should be shown the graphical representation of moderating effect table and the Baseline regression results table.

There are specific typos and Grammatical errors which must be removed.

Author Response

Please see the attachment.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 4 Report

This paper is ready to be published in the current form

Author Response

Thanks for your kindness and we have checked the paper more in details for publishing.

Round 2

Reviewer 1 Report

The author/s presents an exciting yet significant research methodology. After adding literature, Now manuscript has improved subsequently after revisions. The author has carefully addressed all the comments—the corresponding changes and refinements made in the revised paper by the reviewer points.

Author Response

Thanks for your kindness and constructive comments.

Reviewer 2 Report

No more comments

Author Response

Thanks for your kindness and constructive comments.

Reviewer 3 Report

Please revise the bottom note of Table-3: Table-11 because the existing phrase is wrong. The author has presented the T-values in parentheses, but it’s written as brackets at the bottom note.

The T-values and significance levels are also ambiguous and revised according to the anatomy of T-value ranges and significance table with proper justification.  Please check "E-views manual for T-value"

Author Response

Please see the attachment.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Round 3

Reviewer 3 Report

Dear authors,

Please include the Limitation of research and the future direction in the Conclusion Section separately. Like as,

7.3 Limitation of this research

7.4 Future direction of study

 

Author Response

Thanks for your constructive suggestion. Please see the attachment.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf