Water Supply Portfolio Planning and Policy Evaluation under Climate Change: A Case Study of Central Taiwan

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

This study runs a previously developed water supply portfolio model under an extreme climate scenario to develop a feasible water supply portfolio in central Taiwan. The topic is significantly important and the study's findings would be of value in achieving a sustainable and resilient water system. My only suggestion is the authors more elaborate on the future direction of this study and how demand-side solutions can be integrated with their current study.

Author Response

Point 1: My only suggestion is the authors more elaborate on the future direction of this study and how demand-side solutions can be integrated with their current study. 

Response 1: Thank you for your comment. We added possible direction about demand-side management in conclusion section as below:

In the future, water conservation requirements can be planned for each period on the basis of a "supply determined model". For example, the water conservation can be set as variables which describe the amount of water that can be saved and the related cost of water conservation measures. Then the results of the model can be used to determine the optimal intensity of those measures by policy-makers.

Reviewer 2 Report

The manuscript “Water Supply Portfolio Planning and Policy Evaluation under Climate Change: A Case Study of Central Taiwan” is an interesting study challenging the  interdisciplinary approach.

The water quality and quantity is the challenge of 21st century that we can’t overlooked. This is a well conducted study, however some of the conclusions/ ideas presented here need to be more studied and validate in the future.

The introduction part is well written and contains good literature review.

The part Material and Methods – this section is not very reader friendly for not experts in finance. 

The part of Results is good one. It contains enough information for reader to read the discussion chapter.

Well but some parts of Discussion fit to more to Results or Conclusion. Please check it one more time and change.

All these findings only confirm importance of this study. It is very interesting for reader, or researcher in this field.

The article topic is interesting, but there is a lack of a deeper analysis of the climatic conditions in this specific area (missing some geographical data, etc.), as well as environmental costs analysis. The use of such models to calculate prices and select of suitable scenario for another area is not so easy.

In its current form, and in my opinion, the article has no so important impact on the scientific knowledge.    

Formal corrections:

I miss the Table 2. 

I suggest to include flow chart for the methodology – it helps the reader not to get lost in this part.

 

Author Response

Point 1: The part Material and Methods – this section is not very reader friendly for not experts in finance.

Response 1: Thank you for your comments. We modify the subtitle of the section 2 and Section 3 (the part Material and Methods) as well as adding a flow chart for the methodology of this article for the purpose of reader friendly. (Please see the section 2 and section respectively)  

Point 2: Some parts of Discussion fit to more to Results or Conclusion. Please check it one more time and change.

Response 2: Thank you for your comment. In section 2, we modified the title of section 2.3.2 to “Results analysis” and added section 2.4 “Discussions” in the revised manuscript.

Point 3: The article topic is interesting, but there is a lack of a deeper analysis of the climatic conditions in this specific area (missing some geographical data, etc.), as well as environmental costs analysis. The use of such models to calculate prices and select of suitable scenario for another area is not so easy.

Response 3: Thank you for your comment. The topic of this study is significantly important and the findings would be of value in achieving a sustainable and resilient water system. There some illustrations of the hydrology and climate condition in this specific area, please see 2.2.1 and 2.3 (table1-5).owever, this study is still a preliminary research and a lot of challenges have to be overcome. For example, some data is rare in specific area (e.g. ecological base flow) and some environmental impacts and related costs of water supply facilities are difficult to be quantified (e.g. carbon emission) due to the lack of investigation. Therefore, our aim is to establish a basic module that can be applied to different conditions and areas as long as the related parameters are available. We prefer to provide a clear direction on further researches so that the model can be more comprehensive and applicable in the future. 

Point 4: Table 2 is missed

Response 4: Thank you for your comment. The header of “Table 2” was omitted and we added it at in revised manuscript. 

Point 5: I suggest to include flow chart for the methodology – it helps the reader not to get lost in this part.

Response 5: Thank you for your comment. The flow chart is added in the Section 2.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf