Does Public Environmental Affect Influence the World’s Largest Electric Vehicle Market? A Big Data Analytics Study of China

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

Basic remarks:

The article presents the results of research on factors influencing consumers' willingness to choose electric vehicles. The study aims to assess the impact of social sentiment on the environment at the macro level. This topic certainly refers to issues that are important and current for researchers in the field of electromobility, among other things, it fits into the subject of the journal and certainly deserves attention. However, in the presented form it requires fundamental corrections and improvements. .
Right at the beginning, the title itself is burdened with a logical error and the structure of the article itself is not fully transparent. The objectives of the study (especially since there are no hypotheses) are not well defined. The work is weakened by the lack of an innovative approach to the topic, i.e. drawing attention to the essence of the research problem and clearly emphasizing the authors' contribution to the development of research on this subject. The shortcoming is not only the fragmentary content of the introduction, but also the lack of references to similar research results by other scientists based on other sources and concerning, for example, other countries and presented in terms of demand and supply. The chapter on literature research is incomplete, failing to address several key economic factors for the development of this market: TCO and residual value technical solutions - development of DC charging station infrastructure and BEV technology vehicles, or NEV, which stands for "New Energy Vehicle" and is a term used to describe all types of electric vehicles, from fully battery-powered electric vehicles to plug-in hybrids and hydrogen-powered vehicles. In this case, the work is partially weakened by the lack of research input - data analysis is based on methods that are partially described (no description of constraints, no research sample of the research period, etc.) and scenario presentation (no constraints for the scenarios), e.g. the described statistical method does not allow for full verification of the objectives, let alone the hypotheses. Such a pattern of behavior is scientifically insufficient. All considerations require a detailed description of the research methods used. . The authors incorrectly use the concept of environmental impact throughout the work when talking about low-emission vehicles. Incorrectly identifying dependent and independent variables in the case of LCC. In addition, there is a lack of information on economic aspects, in particular costs, vehicle purchase price, operation, price per kWh - the considerations presented are insufficient - these variables affect the cost of emissions, even C02 or total. The work is weakened most by the lack of authorial contribution in the form of an innovative approach based, for example, on statistical or algorithmic methods - presentation of their own model. The authors base their research solely on a simple research scheme, which is not fully described. The verification of research hypotheses on the basis of the adopted scheme of applied procedures (without specifying limitations, initial scenarios, formulas, algorithms, etc.) is highly controversial, and their scientific value is not the subject of consideration. The presented conclusions and discussion do not result directly from the presented research. The literature also requires supplementation due to the current and often discussed research topics. Detailed notes: 1. Title of the article - consider revising it to fully reflect the content. In its current form it contains a logical and methodological error. They analyze a selected case study - China, secondly they do not analyze all factors that have an environmental impact. 2 Abstract - requires re-editing. In its current form, for example: (selection of research participants, assumptions, measurements and methods used, test dates - where was the data obtained and in what period of time, which parameters were omitted and why, what are the key results and main conclusions. How does the study affect the current state of the market, because it is 2025. Considering that the already available data indicate higher sales of NEV vehicles than ICE. 3.Keywords - electromobility, environmental analyses, development scenarios, case study. 4.Introduction - the context of describing the basics of electromobility development was not included - the most important aspects regarding demand and supply and their dynamic growth in recent times were not cited. In addition - the description of the determinants of technological and economic limitations was omitted, the currently used technologies were not described, the authors' contribution to science in the form of an innovative approach to the research topic was not described. 5.Literature review - should be supplemented with publications and discussions with other authors on the economic determinants of TCO, residual value and technological progress. 6. The Research Methodology chapter must be divided into individual sections that are worth paying attention to - The current description of the research is not a sufficient tool to verify the indicated goals (lack of justification for the tool used - adopted criteria, description of solutions and practical limitations, innovativeness of the experimental method - all presented methods and their description should be understandable to a person who is not an expert in the subject). There is a noticeable need to present a model for assessing scenarios - barriers and benefits, e.g. based on formulas, algorithms, e.g. artificial intelligence or statistical methods. The authors should familiarize themselves with the literature on the subject and methods of verifying individual factors influencing the purchase of electric vehicles. (Literature suggestions). 7. The quality of the presentation of data contained in tables 1, 2, 3 - (proper description) should be improved, which parameters are considered important, which were omitted and with what values. 8. The scenario variant should include the years up to 2030 and make a forecast based on the presented data using appropriate statistical methods. 9. The presented formula raises doubts in terms of methodological correctness. It should be remembered which variables are measurable and which were omitted by the authors in the analysis. 10. Chapter 4 This is a presentation of considerations in the form of insufficiently described scenarios. The study requires a description (formula, assumptions of limitations), similarly to the results presented above, the lack of description of the applied method means that the scientific value in a foreign form is limited. 11. The presentation of data in tables 4 to 9 requires a broader description of variables and its proper interpretation in accordance with the adopted analysis patterns for the individual described variables. In their current form, they have no scientific value. 12. Conclusions - presented in this section do not result directly from the presented research. The weakness is the lack of reference to the possibility of their practical application in a global perspective. In particular, the Chinese automotive market operates on completely different principles than the European one, but the determinants for the development of electromobility and the assessment of environmental effects are the same. This is missing in the current section. 13. References - should be supplemented with MDPI literature items related to the mentioned issues. For example:
Life Cycle Cost Assessment of Electric Vehicles: A Review and Bibliometric Analysis. Sustainability 2020, 12, 2387. https://doi.org/10.3390/su12062387 14. A description of the abbreviations used should be added at the end of the paper. 15.The entire text should undergo a thorough linguistic proofreading. In summary, the reviewer appreciates the authors' attempt to present a different perspective on the development of electromobility using the example of a case study of the Chinese market. However, in its current form, the work requires significant proofreading for the good of both the authors themselves and maintaining the high prestige of MDPI publishing house. Comments on the Quality of English Language

English requires minor correction.

Author Response

Please see the attachment.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 2 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

1. The manuscript does not go deep enough into the theoretical foundations of “environmental emotions” and does not clearly distinguish the difference between “emotions” and “attitudes”, resulting in a blurring of the boundaries of the core concepts.
2. The article mainly relies on Weibo text data to measure environmental sentiment, but the characteristics of user groups are different from those of all consumers, which may lead to sample bias.
3. Policy recommendations are too general (e.g., “strengthen infrastructure development”) and lack specific implementation paths.
4. The study finds that positive environmental sentiment has a significant impact on the sales of new energy vehicles in China, but there are differences in the culture and market structure of different countries and regions, and it is recommended to carry out cross-cultural comparative research in future research to verify the applicability of other markets.
5. There are some expressions that need to be corrected, e.g., Tables 2 and 3 are not cited in the main text; Formula (1) does not specify the meaning of each parameter; the format of Table 4 is incorrect; the reference format of the article is inconsistent; and Table 3 is not described in the text.

Author Response

Please see the attachment.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 3 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

This manuscript proposes a detained review paper on examining the macro-level impact of public environmental sentiment on NEV sales. The writing and presentation are comprehensive and insightful.

 

Some suggestions are:

 

1. The abbr “NEV” is uncommonly used. So called “New energy vehicle” sounds like a direct translation from 新能源汽车. The majority of the world use “electric vehicle” to define those vehicles propelled by electric motors.
2. The title says Electric Vehicle Market in the World, however, most of the study focuses and data are from China domestic market. Please add more information and analysis on international markets such as Europe and United states.
3. Although plenty of data are used in this study, there is not a single figure/comparative logic graph present. Please utilize the advantage of the figures to dig out more relationships and findings of the test results.

Author Response

Please see the attachment.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 4 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

Please further improve the paper based on the comments below:

1. The abstract's logic requires reorganization, as the existing issues in current research and the advantages of the proposed method have not been clearly articulated. Furthermore, alongside qualitative analysis, quantitative indicators should also be included in the abstract.
2. Some references in the Introduction section are too old. The author needs to cite the most recent articles published in the field.
3. The Introduction should clarify the necessity and importance of the current research by evaluating and comparing the existing literatures.
4. For new energy vehicles, it would be helpful to add a discussion of fuel cell vehicles in the introduction, such as: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.enconman.2024.119032, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.apenergy.2023.122228
5. Provide more details on how environmental clarity indicators are constructed and how the validity and reliability of these indices are ensured.
6. Please add more details on why you chose the TextCNN model
7. The writing details of this paper need to be improved and the quality of the paper's writing needs to be improved.
8. Please improve the overall quality of the figures in the paper.

Comments on the Quality of English Language

The writing details of this paper need to be improved.

Author Response

Please see the attachment.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Round 2

Reviewer 1 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

After proofreading, the reviewer does not make any comments to the text.
I congratulate the authors on their idea and wish them creative continuation of research in this field.

Reviewer 2 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

我建议接受这份手稿出版。

Reviewer 4 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

Tanks for your effort, there is no further comments.