Simulations of scenarios for urban household water and energy consumption

Marco Casazza; Jingyan Xue; Shupan Du; Gengyuan Liu; Sergio Ulgiati

doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0249781

Peer Review History

Original SubmissionDecember 31, 2020
11 Feb 2021 Decision Letter - Ghaffar Ali, Editor PONE-D-20-40863 Simulation of scenarios for urban household water and energy consumption PLOS ONE Dear Dr. Casazza, Thank you for submitting your manuscript to PLOS ONE. After careful consideration, we feel that it has merit but does not fully meet PLOS ONE’s publication criteria as it currently stands. Therefore, we invite you to submit a revised version of the manuscript that addresses the points raised during the review process. Please submit your revised manuscript by Mar 28 2021 11:59PM. If you will need more time than this to complete your revisions, please reply to this message or contact the journal office at plosone@plos.org. When you're ready to submit your revision, log on to https://www.editorialmanager.com/pone/ and select the 'Submissions Needing Revision' folder to locate your manuscript file. 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Is the manuscript technically sound, and do the data support the conclusions? The manuscript must describe a technically sound piece of scientific research with data that supports the conclusions. Experiments must have been conducted rigorously, with appropriate controls, replication, and sample sizes. The conclusions must be drawn appropriately based on the data presented. Reviewer #1: Yes Reviewer #2: Yes ******** 2. Has the statistical analysis been performed appropriately and rigorously? Reviewer #1: Yes Reviewer #2: Yes ****** 3. Have the authors made all data underlying the findings in their manuscript fully available? The PLOS Data policy requires authors to make all data underlying the findings described in their manuscript fully available without restriction, with rare exception (please refer to the Data Availability Statement in the manuscript PDF file). The data should be provided as part of the manuscript or its supporting information, or deposited to a public repository. For example, in addition to summary statistics, the data points behind means, medians and variance measures should be available. If there are restrictions on publicly sharing data—e.g. participant privacy or use of data from a third party—those must be specified. Reviewer #1: Yes Reviewer #2: Yes ****** 4. Is the manuscript presented in an intelligible fashion and written in standard English? PLOS ONE does not copyedit accepted manuscripts, so the language in submitted articles must be clear, correct, and unambiguous. Any typographical or grammatical errors should be corrected at revision, so please note any specific errors here. Reviewer #1: Yes Reviewer #2: Yes ****** 5. Review Comments to the Author Please use the space provided to explain your answers to the questions above. You may also include additional comments for the author, including concerns about dual publication, research ethics, or publication ethics. (Please upload your review as an attachment if it exceeds 20,000 characters) Reviewer #1: This article simulations of scenarios arising from varying degrees of household water and energy consumption in the Napoli metropolitan city of Italy. The findings arising from the research are important and timely. The article is very structured and reads well. It can be considered for publication in the PLOS ONE with minor revisions. Introduction: It is good, but it lacks a comprehensive setup. Authors could consider revising it as it is not linked up nicely especially the first paragraph seems more like in bits and pieces. Methods and Results Technically strong and well explained. However, I could have condensed the methods with an explanation given in the supplementary text (Just a suggestion). Discussion and Conclusion Very sound and well written. No comments. Reviewer #2: See comments in attachment. To the best of my knowledge the manuscript is technically sound and seriously support the conclusion, official statistical data was obtained by the authors and a sample survey was carried out using 248 university students as volunteers and the data was made available. Statistical analysis were performed. Detail of these analysis can be obtained from supplementary sheets provided by authors. Finally the manuscript was written using standard English with some grammatical errors. In general the language was clear and sound and it meet the specification by PLOS ONE JOURNAL. ****** 6. PLOS authors have the option to publish the peer review history of their article (what does this mean?). If published, this will include your full peer review and any attached files. If you choose “no”, your identity will remain anonymous but your review may still be made public. Do you want your identity to be public for this peer review?** For information about this choice, including consent withdrawal, please see our Privacy Policy. Reviewer #1: No Reviewer #2: No [NOTE: If reviewer comments were submitted as an attachment file, they will be attached to this email and accessible via the submission site. Please log into your account, locate the manuscript record, and check for the action link "View Attachments". If this link does not appear, there are no attachment files.] While revising your submission, please upload your figure files to the Preflight Analysis and Conversion Engine (PACE) digital diagnostic tool, https://pacev2.apexcovantage.com/. PACE helps ensure that figures meet PLOS requirements. To use PACE, you must first register as a user. Registration is free. Then, login and navigate to the UPLOAD tab, where you will find detailed instructions on how to use the tool. If you encounter any issues or have any questions when using PACE, please email PLOS at figures@plos.org. Please note that Supporting Information files do not need this step. Attachments Attachment Submitted filename: NEXUS.pdf https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0249781.r001
Revision 1
8 Mar 2021 Author Response Dear Editor, Dear Reviewers, Thank you very much for your efforts and work to support us in improving the quality of our manuscript. Introductory reply We agree with all the indications given by the reviewers. We noticed the presence of several grammar errors. In order to remove them and to improve the quality of the manuscript, we required the support of AJE professional editing services, being one of the companies indicated by PLOS ONE website. In particular, the manuscript was edited for proper English language (British English), grammar, punctuation, spelling, and overall style. Following the professional editing indication, we modified the title from “Simulation of scenarios for urban household water and energy consumption” to “Simulations of scenarios for urban household water and energy consumption”. Besides the language revision, the quality editing identified 1 error in Figure 5 (the lack of separation between “Time” and “(year)”), which was corrected. The figure originally appeared to be Figure 7 (before moving Figure 1 and Figure 2 to the Supplementary Materials file, numbering them as Figure 1S and Figure 2S). The words “Non meat & diary” was modified by the editing service as “Nonmeat and nondairy”. Since the same text was reported in Figure 2 (now, Figure 2S), we revised the figure accordingly. Following the indications given by Reviewer #1, we moved part of the method, related to details about the simulator structure, in the supplementary materials file, section S1. In fact, we believe that this suggested option enhances the readability of the manuscript. Consequently, we re-numbered the Supplementary Material file sections accordingly. Following the indications given by Reviewer #2, we improved the brightness of the legends in Figures 4, 5 and 6 (now, Figures 2, 3 and 4). Besides the sub-section titles size (originally 12 pt, now 11 pt), the style review by AJE detected some inconsistencies in the main text (sometimes, the main text was 12 pt, while, in other parts, the text size was 11 pt). We modified the main text size, using a uniform 11 pt size. Figure 1 and Figure 2 are now numbered as Figure 1S and Figure 2S, since they are now found in the Supplementary Materials file. Consequently, the numbering of figures has changed. Figures 4, 5 and 6 are now Figures 2, 3 and 4. All figures numbers have been changed and checked. The same check has been performed along the text to have the correct relation between the main text and figures. Detailed response to reviewers Reviewer #1: 1. Introduction: It is good, but it lacks a comprehensive setup. Authors could consider revising it as it is not linked up nicely especially the first paragraph seems more like in bits and pieces. Thank you for your comment. The poor language quality made the text not linked up nicely, as you state here. This is why we asked a language revision, also including a style revision. 2. Methods and Results. Technically strong and well explained. However, I could have condensed the methods with an explanation given in the supplementary text (Just a suggestion). Thank you for your comment. Thinking about you suggestion, we decided to move the sub-section “Household FEW nexus structure” to the supplementary materials file, section S1. In fact, we believe that this suggested option enhances the readability of the manuscript. Consequently, we added a sentence in the main text to indicate the presence of section S1. We also re-numbered the following supplementary materials sections accordingly. Figure 1 and Figure 2 are now numbered as Figure 1S and Figure 2S, since they are now found in the Supplementary Materials file. Consequently, the figures numbering has changed. Figures 4, 5 and 6 are now Figures 2, 3 and 4. Reviewer #2 1. There are a lot of grammatical errors in the manuscript We agree with your comment. In order to remove them and to improve the quality of the manuscript, we required the support of AJE professional editing services, being one of the companies indicated by PLOS ONE website. In particular, the manuscript was edited for proper English language (British English), grammar, punctuation, spelling, and overall style. 2. The legends in Figures 4, 5 and 6 should be made brighter We agree with your comment. We modified the legends of the three figures accordingly. Please, note that Figure 1 and Figure 2 are now numbered as Figure 1S and Figure 2S, since they are now found in the Supplementary Materials file. Consequently, the numbering of figures has changed. In particular, Figures 4, 5 and 6 are now Figures 2, 3 and 4. All figures numbers have been changed and checked. The same check has been performed along the text to have the correct relation between the main text and figures. 3. In organization of paper, authors only bolded Sections, I suggest that the subsections should also be bolded but different font size. We agree with your comment. We noticed the problem. We modified the text in the following way: Section title: Times New Roman, bold, 12 pt Sub-section title: Times New Roman, bold, 11 pt Main text: Times New Roman, normal, 11 pt Figures and tables captions: Times New Roman, normal, 10 pt Final remarks We include the professional revision certificate together with the reviews files. Finally, we hope that you will appreciate our efforts in improving the manuscript quality, following your requirements and suggestions. Attachments Attachment Submitted filename: Response_Urban_household_resouces_REV01.pdf https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0249781.r002
25 Mar 2021 Decision Letter - Ghaffar Ali, Editor Simulations of scenarios for urban household water and energy consumption PONE-D-20-40863R1 Dear Dr. Casazza, We’re pleased to inform you that your manuscript has been judged scientifically suitable for publication and will be formally accepted for publication once it meets all outstanding technical requirements. Within one week, you’ll receive an e-mail detailing the required amendments. When these have been addressed, you’ll receive a formal acceptance letter and your manuscript will be scheduled for publication. An invoice for payment will follow shortly after the formal acceptance. To ensure an efficient process, please log into Editorial Manager at http://www.editorialmanager.com/pone/, click the 'Update My Information' link at the top of the page, and double check that your user information is up-to-date. If you have any billing related questions, please contact our Author Billing department directly at authorbilling@plos.org. If your institution or institutions have a press office, please notify them about your upcoming paper to help maximize its impact. If they’ll be preparing press materials, please inform our press team as soon as possible -- no later than 48 hours after receiving the formal acceptance. Your manuscript will remain under strict press embargo until 2 pm Eastern Time on the date of publication. For more information, please contact onepress@plos.org. Kind regards, Ghaffar Ali, PhD Academic Editor PLOS ONE Additional Editor Comments (optional): Reviewers' comments: Reviewer's Responses to Questions Comments to the Author 1. If the authors have adequately addressed your comments raised in a previous round of review and you feel that this manuscript is now acceptable for publication, you may indicate that here to bypass the “Comments to the Author” section, enter your conflict of interest statement in the “Confidential to Editor” section, and submit your "Accept" recommendation. Reviewer #1: All comments have been addressed Reviewer #2: All comments have been addressed ******** 2. Is the manuscript technically sound, and do the data support the conclusions? The manuscript must describe a technically sound piece of scientific research with data that supports the conclusions. Experiments must have been conducted rigorously, with appropriate controls, replication, and sample sizes. The conclusions must be drawn appropriately based on the data presented. Reviewer #1: Yes Reviewer #2: (No Response) ****** 3. Has the statistical analysis been performed appropriately and rigorously? Reviewer #1: Yes Reviewer #2: (No Response) ****** 4. Have the authors made all data underlying the findings in their manuscript fully available? The PLOS Data policy requires authors to make all data underlying the findings described in their manuscript fully available without restriction, with rare exception (please refer to the Data Availability Statement in the manuscript PDF file). The data should be provided as part of the manuscript or its supporting information, or deposited to a public repository. For example, in addition to summary statistics, the data points behind means, medians and variance measures should be available. If there are restrictions on publicly sharing data—e.g. participant privacy or use of data from a third party—those must be specified. Reviewer #1: No Reviewer #2: (No Response) ****** 5. Is the manuscript presented in an intelligible fashion and written in standard English? PLOS ONE does not copyedit accepted manuscripts, so the language in submitted articles must be clear, correct, and unambiguous. Any typographical or grammatical errors should be corrected at revision, so please note any specific errors here. Reviewer #1: Yes Reviewer #2: (No Response) ****** 6. Review Comments to the Author Please use the space provided to explain your answers to the questions above. You may also include additional comments for the author, including concerns about dual publication, research ethics, or publication ethics. (Please upload your review as an attachment if it exceeds 20,000 characters) Reviewer #1: Authors have addressed all the comments in the revised version. I am now happy to accept the manuscript. Reviewer #2: The current version of the manuscript is a significant improvement over the previous one. All the concerns I raised in the previous manuscript have been addressed by the authors. Therefore, without any reservation, the manuscript should be considered for publication. ****** 7. PLOS authors have the option to publish the peer review history of their article (what does this mean?). If published, this will include your full peer review and any attached files. If you choose “no”, your identity will remain anonymous but your review may still be made public. Do you want your identity to be public for this peer review?** For information about this choice, including consent withdrawal, please see our Privacy Policy. Reviewer #1: No Reviewer #2: No Attachments Attachment Submitted filename: PLOS ONE 1.pdf https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0249781.r003
Formally Accepted
26 Mar 2021 Acceptance Letter - Ghaffar Ali, Editor PONE-D-20-40863R1 Simulations of scenarios for urban household water and energy consumption Dear Dr. Casazza: I'm pleased to inform you that your manuscript has been deemed suitable for publication in PLOS ONE. Congratulations! Your manuscript is now with our production department. If your institution or institutions have a press office, please let them know about your upcoming paper now to help maximize its impact. If they'll be preparing press materials, please inform our press team within the next 48 hours. Your manuscript will remain under strict press embargo until 2 pm Eastern Time on the date of publication. For more information please contact onepress@plos.org. If we can help with anything else, please email us at plosone@plos.org. Thank you for submitting your work to PLOS ONE and supporting open access. Kind regards, PLOS ONE Editorial Office Staff on behalf of Dr. Ghaffar Ali Academic Editor PLOS ONE https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0249781.r004

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