Long-Term Ecological Environment Quality Evaluation and Its Driving Mechanism in Luoyang City
Round 1
Reviewer 1 Report
Title- Long-Term Ecological Environment Quality Evaluation and Its Driving Mechanism of Luoyang City
1. How reliable is the Remote Sensing Ecological Index (RSEI) as a comprehensive evaluation model for ecological environment quality?
2. Were there any limitations or potential biases in using Landsat remote sensing images and statistical yearbooks as data sources for the study?
3. What specific factors were considered in the trend analysis and mutation testing to evaluate the spatiotemporal changes in ecological environment quality?
4. How were the regions with poor RSEI values in the northern urban areas of Luoyang City affected by intensive human activities? Were specific activities or industries identified?
5. Was the higher vegetation coverage in the southern mountainous areas solely responsible for the better ecological environment quality, or were there other contributing factors?
6. How did the researchers determine the ecological environment quality grades and their increase from 47.2% to 67.5%? What criteria were used?
7. Can the study conclusively establish a causal relationship between population change and the ecological environment quality, or are other factors influencing the results?
8. What specific mechanisms or processes explain the interaction between temperature and GDP and their impact on RSEI fluctuations?
9. Were there any challenges or limitations in using the Geographical Detector to analyze the driving factors of ecological environment quality changes?
10. How were the natural and anthropogenic factors separated and evaluated in determining the existing ecological environment condition in the study area?
11. What additional research or data would be helpful in further understanding the long-term ecological environment quality and driving mechanisms in Luoyang City?
Author Response
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Author Response.pdf
Reviewer 2 Report
The article titled "Long-Term Ecological Environment Quality Evaluation and Its Driving Mechanism of Luoyang City" presents a comprehensive evaluation of the ecological environment quality in Luoyang City. Overall, the article provides valuable insights into the long-term environmental dynamics and their underlying driving mechanisms in the region. However, there are a few areas where the article could be further improved to enhance its impact and contribute to policy implications.
To enhance the policy implications of the study, the article could benefit from a more explicit discussion on the practical applications of the findings. It would be valuable to explore how the identified driving mechanisms can be effectively managed and regulated to improve the ecological environment in Luoyang City.
Another area for improvement is the literature review section, specifically concerning the ecological environment from different perspectives. The article would benefit from a more comprehensive review of relevant studies that examine ecological environment and its impact on environmental quality. In this regard, I recommend citing the following articles:
Popescu, Ruxandra I., Razvan A. Corbos, Mihaela Comănescu, and Ovidiu I. Bunea. 2017. "Ecological marketing—Strategic option for business development in Bucharest." Economic Computation and Economic Cybernetics Studies and Research 51: 67–83.
Popescu, R. I., Corboş, R. A., & Bunea, O. I. (2018). "Study on the perception of young Romanians on the eco-marketing and promotion efficiency in increasing the environmental NGOs competitiveness." Calitatea, 19(S1), 417-422.
By incorporating these references, the authors can strengthen their discussion on the importance of different perspectives in evaluating and addressing ecological challenges.
Author Response
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Author Response File: Author Response.pdf
Reviewer 3 Report
In the manuscript of “Long-Term Ecological Environment Quality Evaluation and Its Driving Mechanism of Luoyang City”, the authors investigated the spatiotemporal dynamic changes in the ecological environment quality of Luoyang City from 2002 to 2022 through trend analysis and mutation testing. Using the Remote Sensing Ecological Index (RSEI), a comprehensive evaluation model based on data from Landsat remote sensing images and statistical yearbooks. The work presented is relevant to the Journal's field. The manuscript has got some potential. I would like to congratulate the authors for a considerable amount of work that they have done. Especially, the authors reported that average RSEI value in Luoyang City has increased by 0.102 in the past 20 years, indicating an overall improvement in the ecological environment quality of Luoyang City. In addition, the authors also argued that the population change was the strongest single factor influencing the ecological environment quality change in Luoyang City. The interaction between temperature and GDP was relatively strongest. The current ecological environment status in the study area is the result of the combined effects of natural and human factors. This manuscript has provided a new case to better understand the long-term ecological environment quality evaluation and its driving mechanism of city in China. However, the manuscript needs further improved before to be accepted for publication. The reviewer has listed some specific comments that might be helpful of the authors to further enhance the quality of the manuscript. Please consider the particular comments listed below:
1, The authors need to improve the abstract. Therefore, the abstract should answer these questions about your manuscript: What was done? Why did you do it? What did you find? Why are these findings useful and important? Answering these questions lets readers know the most important points about your study and helps them decide whether they want to read the rest of the paper. Make sure you follow the proper journal manuscript formatting guidelines when preparing your abstract.
2, section of Introduction. Although the section is well-structured and well-organized, the novelty of this paper should be further justified by highlighting main contributions to the existing introduction and literature review. This could be clearly presented in your related work. Please consider citing following papers entitled “Accelerating urbanization serves to reduce income inequality without sacrificing energy efficiency–Evidence from the 78 countries”; and entitled ““Does urbanization redefine the environmental Kuznets curve? An empirical analysis of 134 Countries”; and entitled “The effects of population aging, life expectancy, unemployment rate, population density, per capita GDP, urbanization on per capita carbon emissions”; and entitled “The effects of energy prices, urbanization and economic growth on energy consumption per capita in 186 countries”; and entitled “Toward to economic growth without emission growth: The role of urbanization and industrialization in China and India”; There has already been a large number of literatures related to your research, i.e. urban, or city. Therefore, it should be better elaborate the contribution of the work to the existing literature, so as to further bridge the gaps between the research background and research purposes.
3. The methods section could benefit from further improvement. It is important to provide a clear justification for the methodology approach used, explaining why it was chosen and how it is
appropriate for the research question at hand. Additionally, it would be helpful to reference prior studies that have successfully used this methodology approach to strengthen the
argument for its use in this particular study.
- The data section requires improvement. The authors must address several key questions to
provide a better understanding of their approach. Specifically, why were these variables selected for the model? What does the existing literature say about these variables? Additionally, it's
important to provide information on previous authors who have used these variables. Without this information, readers may find it difficult to fully comprehend the approach and results
presented in the study.
4. section of Results and Discussion. The section is well-structured and well-organized. However, it would be better to discuss what your findings are different from the past works. A comparison with the results of the previous paper would further enhance the innovative nature of the paper.
5- The authors need to improve the quality of the conclusions section. The conclusions section needs to be supported by the results and the authors need to show how their investigation advances the field from the present state of knowledge.
- To provide more comprehensive and actionable recommendations, the authors should create a dedicated subsection titled "Policy Implications." In this section, they should identify the specific areas where the current policy falls short and explain why their proposed recommendations can help improve the status quo. It's important to keep in mind that policymakers are interested in practical, cost-effective, and socially acceptable solutions, so the authors should address the
following questions before presenting their recommendations:
What specific changes need to be made?
How will these changes be implemented?
What resources will be required to implement the changes, and where will they come from?
What are the overall benefits of the proposed changes for policymakers and society as a whole? By answering these questions, the authors can provide a more compelling and practical set of policy recommendations that can help address the shortcomings of the current policy and lead to positive changes.
- The authors should consider creating a new subsection titled "Limitations and Future
Recommendations". It's essential to address the study's limitations, which are the design or
methodology constraints that may have affected the interpretation of the research findings.
Limitations may have an impact on the ability to generalize results or describe applications for practice, as well as the usefulness of the findings that resulted from the research design or
method used to establish internal and external validity, or unanticipated challenges encountered during the study.
In addition to addressing limitations, future recommendations should consider the following
aspects: (1) building upon a specific finding in the research; (2) addressing a flaw in the research design; (3) testing a theory, framework, or model in a new context, location, or culture; (4) re-
evaluating or (5) expanding a theory, framework, or model. It's important to consider these aspects to ensure that future research is based on solid foundations and provides valuable insights that can inform practice and policy decisions.
- The authors should prioritize improving the presentation quality of the manuscript,
6 particularly with regards to the organization of the text and the presentation of tables and
figures. While the manuscript shows promise, its overall investigation quality requires
improvement. The authors must ensure that the manuscript is both attractive and readable, in order to increase its likelihood of being read and cited. Paying close attention to details in all manuscripts will be critical to achieving this goal.
7, There are still some occasional grammar errors through the revised manuscript especially the article ''the'', ''a'' and ''an'' is missing in many places, please make a spellchecking in addition to these minor issues. In addition, some sentences are too long to be easy to read. It is recommended to change to short sentences, which are easier to read.
8, References. Please check the references in the text and the list; You should update the reference. Please read the latest published papers carefully and format your references according to the format required by Sustainability. If this revised paper is sent to me for re-review, the first thing I will check the references.
Moderate editing of English language required
Author Response
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Author Response File: Author Response.pdf
Reviewer 4 Report
1) The research objectives and methodology should be better explained and motivated.
2) The objectives must be clearly indicated in the abstract.
3) Page 5 - It is not clear how the coefficients of the variables in formulas (2) and (3) were calculated. In addition, there is no statistical analysis to determine the reliability of the obtained values. The authors must record how the coefficients were obtained and also add an appropriate statistical analysis. ("formulas are as follows[16]")
4) Page 5- It is unclear what the difference is between the WET listed in Equation (2) and the WET listed in Equation 3. Are these different variables? If so, it is advisable to use a different notation.
5) A detailed explanation of the equations appearing in the paper must be given. It is desirable that all symbols appear before the equations
6) Equation 12 is unnecessary.
7) Page 8- "It indicates a change point in the time series, and the corresponding point in time is identified as the beginning of the change " This concept of a change point needs to be explained. I suggest adding the following paper, where there is an explanation of a turning point in making predictions.
Hadad, Y., Keren, B., & Gurevich, G. (2017). Improving demand forecasting using change point analysis. International Journal of Business Forecasting and Marketing Intelligence, 3(2), 130-151.
8) Page 9- the equation- y = 0.0061x + 0.4545 -The correlation coefficient and the PVLUE of the coefficients must be added.
9) Page 16- " This study utilized GEE to extract an effective, comprehensive evaluation system for ecological environmental quality." What is meant by an effective, comprehensive assessment evaluation system, and how is it more efficient? How was the effectiveness tested? I did not see a reference to this in the article.
10) Make the exposition tight and clear (right now, it is meandering and redundant, particularly in the first part of the paper).
11) The research objectives and methodology should be better explained and motivated. The objectives must be clearly indicated in the abstract.
The contribution of the manuscript was not clear. What are the contributions to research by writing your manuscript? Write up a paragraph under the Introduction section as the last paragraph. A strong competitive analysis must need.
12) In the conclusions section, the authors should provide a general interpretation of the rustles, the unique contributions of the paper, and the limitations of the research's managerial implications.
13) The authors must add updated articles 3 to 5 references from the journal "Sustainability".
I do hope you find these comments and questions helpful in improving the manuscript.
Author Response
Please see the attachment
Author Response File: Author Response.pdf
Round 2
Reviewer 1 Report
agreed
Reviewer 3 Report
Accept in present form
Reviewer 4 Report
Accept in present form.
