Assessing the Potential of Vegetation Carbon Uptake from Optimal Land Management in the Greater Guangzhou Area

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

 

Report_1

Manuscript ID - land-1934712

Assessing the potential of vegetation carbon sequestration from optimal land management in the greater Guangzhou area

Thank you for submitting your manuscript to the journal of the Land. After carefully reading your paper, I feel that the paper offers an interesting analysis. However, it is insufficient in terms of addressing new theoretical arguments, explaining generic relevance, containing sufficient contributions to the new body of global knowledge from the international perspective, and discussing implications. Therefore, I must be the major revision.

1.      The abstract should be more emphasized and should be concise.

2.      Introduction should be consisting of 4 to 6 paragraphs, please reduced the paragraph in the introduction with concise sentences.

3.      Introduction section lines no 50 and 53 ‘however’ and ‘How’ please remove this ward.

4.      However, the methodology section is built very well based on previous literature. But too long for this methodology section please should be concise.

5.      Please mention which software is used for your research purpose?

6.      Please add the formula and citation of every used index.

7.      What method have you used for image compositions?

8.      Can you use any ground truth verification of your research?

9.      The highlights of the paper do not include any innovative results.

10.  The conclusion section is too long. please use your observation, and remove your repetition of results.

 

 

Author Response

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Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 2 Report

How to define the vegetation carbon sequestration? From the original intention of the author, it should be the total C that can be fixed in the vegetation area, that is, including soil. This issue needs to be explained in the Introduction. On the whole, the article is too long! Importantly, there are too much content of basic common sense!!! This needs thorough simplification. In addition, the structure of the article needs to be reorganized.

 

L35-41: too long!

L57-68: These definitions of productivity are basic knowledge and do not need to be explained in detail. It is suggested to delete them into one sentence.

L69-86: Too long, just a brief introduction to the land use of the city.

L145-158: These contents are recommended in the Introduction.

L162-192: Too many concepts and introductions of all indicators, which belong to basic common sense, can be deleted. Another suggestion is placed them into the Introduction.

L207-313: The methods section is too detailed. Please also supplement the statistical analysis.

 

In addition, there are too many discussions and a large amount of them are speculative and cannot be concluded through the results of this study. Also, a lot of the content should be in the results section.

 

The conclusion is too long, and it is suggested to be shortened to one paragraph.

Author Response

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Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 3 Report

Authors present a very interesting research on the potential benefits (ecological, cultural and for human helath and well-being) of vegetation arears in urban agglomeration using great Guangzhou area as case study.

I strongly suggest to consider the Nature Based Solutions (NBS) as relevant (if not fundamental) topic and concept in relation to urban green areas analysis and assessment. Their importance as ecological services is known worldwide, many scholars and international istitutions and also the European Commission developed numerous studies and practical indications and protocols on them.

Moreover, please consider also the concept of Biotope Area Factor (BAF) as created and uesed in Berlin (BAF – Biotope area factor - Berlin.de). It is an ecological index that allow to analyze the presence and the degree of ecological surface in built context. It is useful also as a urban planning index in order to define possible strategies and actions from a planning point of view (BAF target).

Minor suggestion: as described from line 133 on, it can be useful to insert figures related to the evolution over time of urbanization in GGA. Furthermore, in Figure 1 insert the entire China to better understand where GGA and its region is placed.

Author Response

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Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Round 2

Reviewer 1 Report

Report_2

Manuscript ID - land-1934712

Assessing the potential of vegetation carbon sequestration from optimal land management in the greater Guangzhou area

This paper introduces a smart and interesting case study considering the exploration of vegetation carbon sequestration including Optimal land management.

1. The reason why I suggest again revisions is that the paper is such is still way too long and many of the methods are standard so a more detailed description should be moved to the annexes.

2. The methods section as such includes again much general information which could be easily moved to the annexes.  

3. The results reflect well the complexity of the methods chapter and the discussion is well developed.

Author Response

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Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 2 Report

This has been greatly improved. That is okay. 

Author Response

Thank you.