Enhanced Electrokinetic Remediation for the Removal of Heavy Metals from Contaminated Soils
Round 1
Reviewer 1 Report
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Comments for author File: 
Comments.pdf
Author Response
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Author Response File: 
Author Response.docx
Reviewer 2 Report
This paper proposes an enhancement of the electrokinetic remediation for heavy metal removal from contaminated soils. This is a very interesting work for the scientific community, particularly due to the importance that the presence of heavy metals in soil and the food chain has in human health. The technique proposed in the present study significantly improves the removal rates of several heavy metals such as cadmium, cobalt, copper, zinc, chromium or lead, being the numerical results very significant. The manuscript is very well organized, clearly describing all the materials and methods used and featuring a meaningful description of the experiments and obtained results. The English usage is correct and the figures are clear, with good resolution. All in all, this is a very good piece of work. However, the authors should perform a set of minor, but mandatory, revisions before the manuscript can be considered for publication:
+ In the Introduction, it is said that "Many studies published in literature DEAL with the removal of heavy metals from soil". In order to provide a better state of the art, I suggest to include as well a sentence saying that a lot of research is conducted nowadays on the development of sensing platforms for heavy metal detection. I suggest to add the following couple of references when including that sentence: Journal of Lightwave Technology 37(14), 3495-3502 (2019) & Electrochimica Acta 298, 440-448 (2019).
+ In line 35, the authors use "in situ". However, this expression comes from the Latin and therefore it should be written in italics.
+ In Section 2.1, the authors say "The soil was extended in a thin layer in the lab to let it dry for 72 hours". Can the authors specify the approximate humidity level in the lab?
+ When the authors mention the removal rates of heavy metals from soil, it would be beneficial if they could include a quantity/threshold of heavy metal concentration removal that they consider it is enough or appropriate.
+ Could the authors include a table or a section in which they compare the results obtained through the proposed method with the ones obtained using other techniques present in the literature?
+ The caption of Table 3 is the one from the document template. It has not been modified.
Author Response
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Author Response File: Author Response.docx
Round 2
Reviewer 1 Report
Everything has been revised, and I allow this paper to be published.
