Integrating Plus Energy Buildings and Districts with the EU Energy Community Framework: Regulatory Opportunities, Barriers and Technological Solutions

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

The article "Integrating plus energy buildings and districts with the energy community framework: regulatory opportunities and technological solutions" discusses positive energy buildings and districts from the energy, regulatory and technology perspective. I have no major remarks. The article contains a good and detailed discussion about the challenges and opportunities for PEDs. The authors can use the reviewer's comments below to further improve the manuscript and to develop new ideas and perspectives for future research: 

1. Line 62: Moreno et al. has no reference number [?].
2. In the text, reference numbers should be placed in square brackets [ ], and the references must be numbered in order of appearance in the text, see the Instructions for Authors for more information: https://www.mdpi.com/journal/buildings/instructions
3. Lines 134-135: correct the Error! Bookmark not defined.
4. How are greenhouse gases emissions approached in PEBs and PEDs? The GHG emissions should be net zero or negative? What is the principal goal of PEDs - minimum GHG emissions or positive energy balance? Should the energy technology be selected based on an allowable limit of GHG emissions per unit of generated/consumed thermal/electrical energy (kg_CO2eq/MWh_el, kg_CO2eq/GJ_th)? Should there be a GHG emissions trading system between PEDs to promote the use of cleaner technologies?
5. The first approach is to assess PEDs by the flow of energy. Have you found in the literature any suggestions to assess the PEDs performance by taking into account not only the flow of energy but also the flows of materials, waste, water and food? How should be PEDs be positioned inside the circular economy framework?
6. How should look like the business model for PEDs? Who should invest and build PEDs - country/regional authorities, real estate investors and developers, the local community? How should PEDs be presented and advertised within the local community since it can be expected, especially in the beginning, that the costs of living and the price of utilities will be higher than those of standard residential districts? Should the PEDs receive any form of financial incentive beside the incomes from energy trading?
7. What methods are being developed to assess the future performance of PEDs - for example life cycle analysis, SWOT analysis, environmental footprint, energy and materials balances?
8. Regarding the legislation and regulation for PEDs - who should bring the regulation - international agreements, country and local authorities? Is there a necessity to develop PEDs standards and to what level of detail should PEDs be defined in those regulations/standards? How should different climates, building types, construction technologies, national energy and material resources be included within international regulations or this will be left to each nation to decide for itself?
9. Section 5.3. presents PEDs demos from different EU countries. All these cases are from within the EXCESS project. The authors could further compare these demos with other important case examples from outside the EXCESS project. For example, the following study can be consulted: https://www.mdpi.com/1996-1073/13/22/6083

Author Response

Dear reviewer,

Thanks for you excellent comments and ideas. We took you suggestions as far as possible into account. Some of them will guide our further research. We removed all formatting and citation errors. In particular we discussed the approach to greenhouse gases emissions approached PEBs and PEDs also in technology selection. In the discussion section we consider the positioning of PED in the circular economy. We broadened the discussion from insights of the EXCESS demos to include finding from other related projects.

Best regards,

Andreas Türk

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Reviewer 2 Report

The current format of teh paper is not acceptable to the reviewer as the authors were not able to highlight the main contributions and design their research. The authors should highlight the research gaps and importance of the files as well as proposing an appropriate framework of their work. The analysis and discussion of the model is missing. 

Author Response

Dear reviewer,

We completely rewrote the article.

We now clearly describe research gaps, formulated a research hypothesis, contrast it with evidence from a couple of PEB/PED demos and draw conclusions taking into account also other related projects. We streamlined the story, better clarified the concepts and better linked the chapters. We cut as lot of less relevant information and focused on the main contributions of the paper.

Best regards,

Andreas Türk

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Reviewer 3 Report

The article „Integrating plus energy buildings and districts with the energy community framework: regulatory opportunities and technological solutions “ it has a certain scientific value. However, some improvement is needed. In the following paragraphs I present a few observations that should be taken into account in the revised version of manuscript.

Section “Abstract”:
- at the end of the abstract there is no clearer assessment of the global impact conclusion

Section “Introduction”:

- research hypotheses are missing at the end of the introduction. It is necessary to set hypotheses as it is standard in scientific work. Hypotheses need to be verified or refuted in conclusions.

- at the end of the introduction, it is necessary to define more clearly the objectives of this research and its need in an international context. Specifically, who will benefit from it.

Section “Methods”:

- the methodology for statistical analysis needs to be further refined. It should be complemented, for example, by specifying whether the tests were parametric or not.
- it is necessary to add what has been compared in more detail so that the methodology can be applied purely in the future
- to characterize what hypothesis was verified by what statistical method

Section “conclusion”:

- separate the conclusion section from the discussion

- the established hypotheses need to be upheld.
-the conclusion is to be conceived both locally and globally

- the conclusion should be sharpened and the ballast removed as it is too lengthy
General comments:

- it is necessary to realize how many article words have and adjust it according to the instructions, especially in terms of number of words

- There are few literary sources at work. To strengthen it, I propose to broaden the foundations by comparing them with other work in this area.
- the discussion needs to be completed to have a global reach

- In the discussion I recommend to discuss with already published articles in "this journal" and etc.

-the end must be sharpened and shortened. Remove the ballast.

- the list of literature and the reference to literature in the text is not prepared according to the standards of journal. It is necessary to study the guidelines and adjust it accordingly

I suggest major revision. After removing the shortcomings, I would like to re-examine the manuscript and reconsider my position.

Author Response

Dear reviewer,

Thanks for the comments. We completely rewrote the article. We now clearly describe research gaps, formulated objectives and a research hypothesis, contrast it with evidence from a couple of PEB/PED demos and draw conclusions taking into account also other related projects. We streamlined the story, better clarified the concepts and better linked the chapters. We cut as lot of less relevant information and focused on the main contributions of the paper. We separated discussion and conclusions. We furthermore sharpened the conclusion and removed ballast. We included far more literature in all sections. We reformatted the list of literature and the reference according to the standards of journal.

We hope we made the paper is interesting academically valuable.

Best regards,

Andreas Türk

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Round 2

Reviewer 2 Report

The authors have improved the quality of paper based on reviewers' comments. I have no more comments. 

Reviewer 3 Report

satisfied