Decision Strategy Tool for the Design of Natural Treatment Systems for Wastewater (NTSW) from Isolated Livestock Farms

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report (New Reviewer)

The manuscript addresses Decision strategy tool for the design of natural treatment systems for wastewater (NTSW) of isolated livestock farms. However the research gap is not clearly stated. Why is this paper needed?

The paper is not well structured and English needs reviewing. It is difficult to follow the application and how the tool was created. The paper must be re-structured in order to clearly explain how it is used.

Section 2.2 is surprisingly brief and it cannot be followed.This section must include much more details about the construction of the model. It is impossible to follow.

Waste water characterization is modelled only through one reference. How can this be applied for all the cases? Reliability?

Figure 3 and the conditions are not clearly explained. How are they evaluated?

Several case studies must be performed and checked with the tool.

Conclusions are too short and they do not match the main findings.

Author Response

Please see the attachment.

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Reviewer 2 Report (Previous Reviewer 2)

Authors have provided detailed responses to each comment and queries raised by reviewers. I am satisfied with the comments. They have incorporated all the changes in the revised manuscript. 

Author Response

Thank you for your comment.

Round 2

Reviewer 1 Report (New Reviewer)

The authors have partially tackled the amendments. However some points need to be still reconsidered:

- Waste water characterization is modelled only through one own references. How can this be applied for all the cases? Reliability? Authors claim to base this on previous references, but this must be demonstrated. What is the error coming from this considered study? This must be explained and calculated.

-As for different case studies must be considered, the authors checked only 9 farms in terms of a continuation from previous studies, so these results must be double checked with other possible options. There is no novelty behind this study.

-Conclusions are still too broad. They do not provide average values from the main findings. They do not justify future recommendations based on results obtained.

Author Response

Please see the attachment.

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

This manuscript is a resubmission of an earlier submission. The following is a list of the peer review reports and author responses from that submission.

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

This paper needs serious attention. My comments are listed below:

* The abstract must include research methods and approach, key message, and a summary of key findings. You did not mention any data about flow rate, COD and EC.

*In the introduction, you do not need to divide it into sub-sections, please delete the sub-titles 1.1 to 1.4.

*Create a new section “2.1 locations of the study” to be part of  “Materials and Methods” section, and move Figure 1 to this section and provide a detailed Geographical description of the site with coordinates, etc. The name of the 9 farms must be provided in a legend.

*In Figure 1, you should show the north direction, the scale bar, legend, data on the map, grid, etc. And, what is the name of pig farms marked in red in the Figure? Add it to the legend.

*Line 32: Please add reference in text and in the reference list for “Royal Decree 306/2020, of February 11”.

*Lines 55-57: move this part to the end of the introduction, it is part of the objective.

*Fourth equation in Table 1: this equation is not scientifically correct, the majority of organic matters are insoluble especially if you working with real wastewater. It can be soluble if you are working with a synthetic water in the form of nitrate or nitrite or ammonia, for example.

*Lines 151-157 along with Table 2: move to section 2.1 locations of the study.

*Please refer to Table 2 in the text.

*Line 165: please refer to Table 3 not Table 32.

*Line 203: please refer to Table 4 not Table 3.

* You have to mention on the materials and methods section how samples were collected and the analysis procedures to obtain COD, OM, and EC values listed in Table 4.

*Please unify unit for EC, check Table 4 and line 226.

*Line 228: For farm 1, which farm out of the studied 9 farms you are referring to? Please put its name between brackets.

*You should describe the treatment units in each farm in the Materials and Methods section.

*You need to have a detailed discussion for data in the two Tables in the Appendix.

*In section 3.2: this section lack of discussion, you have mentioned only your results.

*Please when you talk about a range mention the low number first, for example in line 212: change “the range of the observed values of 25,000 and 5,000 mg/L” to “the range of the observed values of 5,000 to 25,000 mg/L”.

*In lines 211 to 216: please also compare your results with the allowable limits.

*Conclusion section must be rewritten. There are a basic steps for writing a conclusion. Conclusion for your research paper must be written in this way: (1) Restate your research topic, (2) Restate the thesis, (3) Summarize the main points, (4) State the significance or results, and (5) Conclude your thoughts.

*Extensive editing of English language and style required.

Reviewer 2 Report

Key comments

1.      In the abstract the author should mention hydraulic Retention Time.

2.      Appendix A Tables check the table numbers

3.      Abstract should be more details and novelty

4.      Fig.2 Not clear sentence overlapped also grammatical mistake. Please check

5.      The mean value is within the range of the observed values of 25,000 and 5,000 mg/L [37], 28,000 and 13,200 mg/L [38], and 14,200 and 9,400 mg/L [32]. This sentence should be replaced by, The mean value is within the range of the observed values of 25,000 and 5,000 mg/L [37], 28,000 and 13,200 mg/L [38], and 14,200 and 9,400 mg/L respectively [32].

6.      Moreover, there are a few corrections that need to be adopted for the overall presentation of this manuscript

7.      Grammar and typos. The manuscript contains some grammatical and typographical errors. The authors need to thoroughly revise the manuscript and correct the errors.