A Sustainable Residential Building Model in North Iraq by Considering Occupant Behaviour, Sociocultural Needs, and the Impact on Energy Use

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

The expected results are obvious, given the characteristics of the buildings. The research is however well structured and focuses on an important aspect, that of the impact of user behavior on energy consumption, even for the best constructed European buildings, for which project values and real values almost never correspond

Author Response

Thank you very much for taking the time to review this manuscript. You did not request any modifications or corrections to the manuscript. 

Reviewer 2 Report

The paper is useful, and I appreciated the mixed method approach to evaluate the research aim from different perspectives. I have provided detailed comments below, which I think the authors could consider when reviewing their work. I hope that they find these constructive. Of importance, please check the figure and table formatting. Parts of them are not visible as they are unfortunately cropped in the paper.

1. L30. Please check the unfortunate “error reference” code that appears here. This also appears on line 118.

2. L42. “Research on the sustainability of the built environment.” I think this can be more accurately described from previous studies, which could be revised to “Research on sustainable green-certification labels has been…” The authors could include more examples these types of research (e.g., Altomonte et al. Indoor environmental quality and occupant satisfaction in green-certified buildings, and Altomonte et al. Satisfaction with indoor environmental quality in BREEAM and non-BREEAM certified office buildings.) This would align well with the narrative in the following paragraph, which talks about specific green-certification labels from different countries.

3. Third paragraph. Thank you for including the different green-certification systems used around the world. As a suggestion, I would recommend that the authors include the country each is typically used in (e.g., CASBEE is normally applied in Japan,) although I understand some might be annexed to international applications (e.g., LEED and BREEAM,) some readers might be interested in knowing this information.

4. L52. This is an interesting aspect, which I agree is often overlooked. I would suggest including some support literature here (e.g., Abdelwahab et al. Users’ window preferences and motivations of shading control: Influence of cultural characteristics.)

5. L66. Please remove “However.” This is a new paragraph, and it is unclear what the argument would be at the beginning of the new text.

6. Are the 40% energy and 30% carbon emissions, correct? Usually, I have seen that the global carbon emissions are around 40% (e.g., WGBC figures are at approximately 40% for carbon.) It might be worth checking this.

7. L107-108. It is worth including that EUI can also be used to describe net-zero buildings. Please also include a relevant research study to support the assertion made for EUI (e.g., see Figure 7 in Kent, Khoa Huynh et al. Energy savings and thermal comfort in a zero energy office building with fans in Singapore.)

8. L167 (comfort considerations are qualitative.) This is not necessarily correct. Physical quantitative parameters (e.g., temperature, illuminance, and sound) are perceived by occupants. How they perceive these parameters can be qualitative (or, probably more accurately “subjectively”) described, can be used to describe how comfortable they are under those conditions. Please consider amending this part of the paper.

9. L172. This is very interesting. It is worth highlighting that privacy is in residential buildings tends to be weighted higher than in other building typologies (Kim et al. Seemo: A new tool for early design window view satisfaction evaluation in residential buildings,) since the function of dwellings can be different.

10. L189. I think it would be important to highlight exactly what are the “social-cultural” behaviors, and how these shape the architectural design to meet occupant expectations. I am aware that privacy can override architectural form (e.g., location of windows) and clarity through glazing (e.g., window and shading design) in some places. However, it would be useful to provide some examples here, and link them to energy.

11. L215. Would it be more accurate and clearer to simple say “mixed methods?” Here, both qualitative and quantitative methods were used, which could imply the mixed methods approach was applied.

12. “get a good cross-section.” Although I understood what the authors were trying to say here, “good” in populating sampling could be viewed as relative. It might be more accurate to simply say “to obtain, as high as close as possible, a cross-section.”

13. Please reference the “Design-Builder energy software”. Also, it might be useful to include the reference to the simulation-engine (EnergyPlus.)

14. Figure 1. Thank you preparing this useful figure illustration. Something that was unclear to me was why “Case study” was categorized as “Qualitative.” Isn’t the case study the location? Perhaps this could be “Workshop” and underneath “Semi-structured interviews.” Also, shouldn’t “Observations” come under “Qualitative?” This would be my understanding of ethnographic observational approaches that are applied to social and behavioral science research.

15. L244. “one month in summer and winter.” Are these the summer and winter solstices?

16. Section 2.2. It might be useful to include whether the interviews were conducted 1-to-1, how long it approximately lasted, and what were the predefined questions.

17. Section 2.3. Please include who evaluated the surveys (e.g., homeowners?) Some examples questions could be useful to include as a screenshot.

18. Figure 2. Please include the dry-bulb temperature (oC) label on the y-axis. Also, a legend that indicates the differences between the green and yellow colors in the plot. The caption says “average,” but “distribution” better describes this data.

19. Figure 5. Please clarify what is “Bad.” Should this be “Bedroom?”

20. Table 4. Thank you for providing this analysis for Figure 8. The results are quite interesting, but I don’t think it is useful to compare the values using only the means. I would suggest that an absolute average difference is used instead (e.g., mean average error.) Please also include the sampling time-interval (e.g., 5-min, 10-min, or longer.) This would help readers gauge how granular the measurements were.

21. Figure 9. These are interesting plots. To improve them please consider scaling the axes. For example, the x-axis (Obs) should range from 10-50 to match the y-axis (Model.)

22. Figure 11. What are the values for the countries (e.g., Spanish, Swidish, France (should be French for consistency?) along the x-axis? Also, is the “Statistical” the computer-based simulation model? Similarly, for Figure 19. Were these energy values simulated under different climate conditions?

23. Figure 12. Please check the formatting of this figure. Half of the plot is not visible.

24. Figure 15. Please also check the formatting for this figure.

Author Response

Thank you very much for taking the time to review this manuscript. Please find the detailed responses in the attached file and the corresponding revisions/corrections highlighted/in track changes in the re-submitted files.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 3 Report

First of all, the research work reflects a relatively sufficient workload, and the research logic is complete. While the design recommendations given in the conclusion, which focus on the occupant behavior and their social-cultural needs,  lack some design reference value and reduces the scientific research value of the manuscript.

By the way, the text editing of the manuscript has significant flaws and requires extensive revisions. 

The readability of the manuscript can be acceptable, but it is better to refine the textual description. 

Author Response

Thank you very much for taking the time to review this manuscript. Please find the detailed responses in the attached file and the corresponding revisions/corrections highlighted/in track changes in the re-submitted files.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Round 2

Reviewer 2 Report

Thank you for revising your work. I could easily visualize all the careful changes made. Below are some minor changes that could be considered to help make your work clearer to readers. Thank you for preparing this interesting paper.

1. Please check 'CO2.' The '2' should be superscript. Similarly, for W/m2 in Table 3.

2. Please check the 'Error Source Codes' that appear. I think this happens when the reference links are broken in the document (e.g. line 38.)

3. 'is supported by an energy-plus.' Please consider changing this to, 'it leverages Energy-Plus as the simulation engine.

4. 'Summer has hot.' Could be 'The summers have high.'

5. Figures 3 and 4. Please carefully check the image formatting and captions. Figure 4 appears before Figure 3. Also, the images overlap with each other.

6. Title 4.3. I think Occupant's should be Occupants'. Please check.

Very minor changes could be considered. Please see my comments and suggestions for more details.

Author Response

Thank you very much for taking the time to review this manuscript, and I hope the correction will be accepted this time.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 3 Report

The revised manuscript has made significant improvements in textual expression. Moreover, the paper provides clear revisions for my proposed revision suggestions, which make the paper more logically rigorous.

Howevert, the text of the figures and tables in the main text has not yet been completely standardized in font. Suggest that the font in Figure 4,6,8,9,18 and Table 7 should be uniformly changed to “TIMES NEW ROMAN”.

The layout of Figure 2,3 and 4 in the revised text is too chaotic, and it is recommended to use "embedded" illustrations.

The number of table in line 686 should be Table 7.

Author Response

Thank you very much for taking the time to review this manuscript. I hope this time corrections  will be accepted.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf