Reservoir Operation Sequence- and Equity Principle-Based Multi-Objective Ecological Operation of Reservoir Group: A Case Study in a Basin of Northeast China
Round 1
Reviewer 1 Report
Although the paper seems interesting, I think that a deeper analysis and discussion is needed regarding the experimental results. The authors use PSO as optimization method, but not much is said about why they use PSO instead of other methods, or about the concrete parameter adjustment that has been carried out.
Regarding other optimization methods, and taking into account that the application area is related to river basins, I wonder why the authors have not considered using any of the multiple water-based metaheuristics available in the literature (e.g. IWD, RFD, WCA, etc., see Water-based metaheuristics: How water dynamics can help us to solve NP-hard problems, Complexity 2019). They should at least consider their application. Anyway, using water-based metaheuristics or not, the authors should consider at least a couple of different optimization methods to compare the results obtained with them.
Regarding the concrete application of PSO, the authors should include the concrete parameters used in the experiments. Moreover, it would be also interesting to show the results obtained with different paramenter configurations, to test whether minor modifications can modify a lot the results or not.
Regarding other minor issues:
-The authors should improve the format of several formulas, where left curly brackets are not correctly introduced (e.g. equations 1, 5, 7...).
-In line 283 you repeat the word "discharge"
-In Figure 9-(e) "Norma" should be "Normal"
Author Response
Please see the attachment.
Author Response File: 
Author Response.pdf
Reviewer 2 Report
1) Joint operation of reservoir group plays a crucial role in water resources management, which, nevertheless, faces a huge challenge due to complex interaction among water, ecological and economic systems. In this manuscript, author proposed a multi-objective ecological operation model of reservoir group based on equity principle to identify the optimization schemes of water allocation under different scenarios of reservoir operation sequence. However, the manuscript still needs a big revise to touch a scientific paper standard such as review in introduction, modeling and description, making charts, drawing conclusion and language.
2) In introduction, author would add reviews on operation of reservoir group including methodological and case study.
3) In materials and method, it is notable that the methods should be clearly described, in particular objective function expressions. And some parameters and variables require more clear description.
4) In addition, the chart and map require further improvement for better readability.
5) The conclusion needs a big revise to answer the proposed scientific question in introduction, not list the results.
6) The language needs further polishing.
Special comments:
Line 24: Names of the modes A, B, C and D is better than unmeaning letters.
Line 71: In practice, river water and reservoir water are used in parallel to meet water demand from multiple water use units, it suggests to add river water to multi-objective ecological operation model.
Line 75: The variables, i.e., Ws and Ec, require more clear description, which covers the whole manuscript.
Line 81: Comma is better than semicolon.
Line 82: Unit of all parameters and variables is required in the whole manuscript.
Line 94: Expression on calculation unit in objective function is different with constraints function, right? For example, the i-the calculation unit in objective function, the i-th reservoir in constraint functions.
Line 95: The variables are required.
Line 101: Implication of the parameter, a, requires a more clear explanation. In addition, what means “water demand for the reservoir supply channel”?
Line 103: What means “overflow capacity” here.
Line 193: In figure 3, the map requires more elements including scale, longitude and latitude. In addition, the map of China requires the standard map of China, some islands are lost in current map.
Line 205: What approaches are used to predict the water demand?
Line 208: What means “internal river”, which is same with river interval in figure 4? The items should be consistent.
Line 315: The figure 10 is not very readable, other expressions can be taken into account, such as, different color scale..
Line 324: What mean the XLC and XXS, reservoirs' number requires a detail description, in particular in the map of the study area.
Author Response
Please see the attachment.
Author Response File: Author Response.pdf
Round 2
Reviewer 1 Report
The authors have improved the presentation of the paper. Anyway, I still miss the use of a couple of different optimization methods to compare the results obtained with them. This experimental comparison would improve the quality of the paper, although it is already publishable in its current form.
Reviewer 2 Report
All comments have been revised.
