PSTR-D-24-00039

Impacts of Green Wall Orientation on Building Energy Performance in a Tropical Climate: An Experimental Assessment

PLOS Sustainability and Transformation

Dear Dr. Jayasooriya,

Thank you for submitting your manuscript to PLOS Sustainability and Transformation. After careful consideration, we feel that it has merit but does not fully meet PLOS Sustainability and Transformation'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 within 60 days Nov 12 2024 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 SustainTransform@plos.org. When you're ready to submit your revision, log on to https://www.editorialmanager.com/pstr/ and select the 'Submissions Needing Revision' folder to locate your manuscript file.

Please include the following items when submitting your revised manuscript:

* A rebuttal letter that responds to each point raised by the editor and reviewer(s). You should upload this letter as a separate file labeled 'Response to Reviewers'.

* A marked-up copy of your manuscript that highlights changes made to the original version. You should upload this as a separate file labeled 'Revised Manuscript with Track Changes'.

* An unmarked version of your revised paper without tracked changes. You should upload this as a separate file labeled 'Manuscript'.

If you would like to make changes to your financial disclosure, please include your updated statement in your cover letter. Guidelines for resubmitting your figure files are available below the reviewer comments at the end of this letter.

We look forward to receiving your revised manuscript.

Kind regards,

Jinkyu Hong

Academic Editor

PLOS Sustainability and Transformation

Journal Requirements:

1. We ask that a manuscript source file is provided at Revision. Please upload your manuscript file as a .doc, .docx, .rtf or .tex.

2. We have amended your Competing Interest statement to comply with journal style. We kindly ask that you double check the statement and let us know if anything is incorrect.

PSTR-D-24-00039

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Additional Editor Comments (if provided):

Please check the reviewers' comments. Also please make sure that this manuscript satisfies the PLOST data policy.

The PLOS Data policy requires authors to make all data underlying the findings described in their manuscript fully available without restriction, with rare exception. 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.

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Reviewers' comments:

Reviewer's Responses to Questions

Comments to the Author

1. Does this manuscript meet PLOS Sustainability and Transformation’s publication criteria ? Is the manuscript technically sound, and do the data support the conclusions? The manuscript must describe methodologically and ethically rigorous research with conclusions that are appropriately drawn based on the data presented.

Reviewer #1: Partly

Reviewer #2: Yes

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2. Has the statistical analysis been performed appropriately and rigorously?

Reviewer #1: Yes

Reviewer #2: Yes

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3. Have the authors made all data underlying the findings in their manuscript fully available (please refer to the Data Availability Statement at the start of the manuscript PDF file)?

The PLOS Data policy requires authors to make all data underlying the findings described in their manuscript fully available without restriction, with rare exception. 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: Yes

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4. Is the manuscript presented in an intelligible fashion and written in standard English?

PLOS Sustainability and Transformation 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

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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: The study experimentally investigated the impact of green wall orientation on building energy performance in a tropical climate. It highlighted the importance of green wall orientation and plant selection for optimizing building energy performance in tropical climates. To enhance clarity, comprehensiveness, and practical applicability, the following revisions are recommended:

1. The description of the experimental setup and data collection procedures needs more details to allow replication. Specifics on the plant growth media, irrigation, and sensor placement should be expanded.

2. The rationale for selecting the plant species is not clearly justified. Please provide more information regarding the background of why these particular species were chosen and their traits.

3. The heat flux calculations require more explanation and validation. Assumptions made when applying the equations should be stated. Please compare calculated values to any empirical measurements.

4. The limitations of this study, particularly the potential long-term impacts and drawbacks associated with green walls, warrant careful consideration. Most existing studies emphasize the potential compromise of building structural integrity due to plant root overgrowth. However, insufficient attention has been given to other significant factors, such as the increased risk of insect proliferation, including mosquitoes, and the potential hazards of infiltrating chemical reagents to maintain green walls into living spaces.

5. The study’s limitations, such as the relatively short data collection period and single location, should be acknowledged. Please, in the discussion section, provide more information regarding how the results may translate to other environments.

6. Some figures and tables are referenced incorrectly or lack proper labels ( page 22, e.g., Figure Error! ...). Ensuring all visuals are correctly labeled and referenced in the text.

7. The authors should provide a comprehensive data availability statement and ensure that all underlying data are accessible within the manuscript, as supporting information, or through a public repository.

Reviewer #2: 1. This article reviews previous researchers' discussions on the thermal performance of green walls. Please verify whether the climate type mentioned in Item 11 of Table 1 for Wuhan City is indeed a tropical climate. Although this is a detail, verifying the accuracy of the cited literature is crucial.

2. In Section 3.3 of the data collection part, it states "Data collection was carried out from June 2021 to February 2021...". Please confirm whether the years and chronological order are correct.

3. The data collection time frame in this study is limited to daytime hours, which may not capture the full diurnal cycle and could affect the accuracy of the interpretation of thermal performance over 24 hours. Additionally, the experimental setup may have included only data collection on clear, sunny days without precipitation. This suggests that the actual data collection period may have been shorter and may not fully represent seasonal variations.

4. Regarding the sample size and duration, collecting data for only 5 days per orientation may not be sufficient to capture changes in weather conditions, which could lead to less reliable statistical analysis. Increasing the sample size or extending the duration of data collection can enhance the robustness of the results.

5. The use of One-Way ANOVA and Tukey's HSD test by the authors to compare means across different groups (orientations and plant species) is appropriate, but including more details about the statistical analysis would be useful.

6. Since the experiment was conducted in a controlled environment, it is important to discuss potential differences in real-world conditions, where factors such as wind, solar radiation, and humidity can vary significantly.

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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.

Do you want your identity to be public for this peer review? If you choose “no”, your identity will remain anonymous but your review may still be made public.

For information about this choice, including consent withdrawal, please see our Privacy Policy .

Reviewer #1: Yes: Rostyslav Sipakov, Ph.D.

Reviewer #2: No

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[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.

PSTR-D-24-00039R1

Impact of Green Wall Orientation on Building Energy Performance in a Tropical Climate: An Experimental Assessment

PLOS Sustainability and Transformation

Dear Dr. Jayasooriya,

Thank you for submitting your manuscript to PLOS Sustainability and Transformation. After careful consideration, we feel that it has merit but does not fully meet PLOS Sustainability and Transformation'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 within 30 days Dec 31 2024 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 SustainTransform@plos.org. When you're ready to submit your revision, log on to https://www.editorialmanager.com/pstr/ and select the 'Submissions Needing Revision' folder to locate your manuscript file.

Please include the following items when submitting your revised manuscript:

* A rebuttal letter that responds to each point raised by the editor and reviewer(s). You should upload this letter as a separate file labeled 'Response to Reviewers'. This file does not need to include responses to any formatting updates and technical items listed in the 'Journal Requirements' section below.

* A marked-up copy of your manuscript that highlights changes made to the original version. You should upload this as a separate file labeled 'Revised Manuscript with Track Changes'.

* An unmarked version of your revised paper without tracked changes. You should upload this as a separate file labeled 'Manuscript'.

If you would like to make changes to your financial disclosure, competing interests statement, or data availability statement, please make these updates within the submission form at the time of resubmission. Guidelines for resubmitting your figure files are available below the reviewer comments at the end of this letter.

We look forward to receiving your revised manuscript.

Kind regards,

Jinkyu Hong

Academic Editor

PLOS Sustainability and Transformation

Jinkyu Hong

Academic Editor

PLOS Sustainability and Transformation

Unai Pascual

Editor-in-Chief

PLOS Sustainability and Transformation

Additional Editor Comments (if provided):

Please check the reviewer #1's comments below.

That said, I noticed that the figures in the submitted manuscript are difficult to read, which seems to be a technical issue. I trust the editorial team will ensure the figures are published in high resolution.

Additionally, while the authors have addressed the topic of so-called "side effects" (e.g., mosquitos, pesticides, etc.) in their response, and I agree that these are beyond the scope of the current study, it might be worthwhile to include a brief note cautioning readers about such potential consequences, which, although outside the current study's remit, deserve attention in future research. It is not uncommon for seemingly minor issues to grow into significant challenges.

[Note: HTML markup is below. Please do not edit.]

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

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2. Does this manuscript meet PLOS Sustainability and Transformation’s publication criteria ? Is the manuscript technically sound, and do the data support the conclusions? The manuscript must describe methodologically and ethically rigorous research with conclusions that are appropriately drawn based on the data presented.

Reviewer #1: Yes

Reviewer #2: Yes

**********

3. Has the statistical analysis been performed appropriately and rigorously?

Reviewer #1: Yes

Reviewer #2: Yes

**********

4. Have the authors made all data underlying the findings in their manuscript fully available (please refer to the Data Availability Statement at the start of the manuscript PDF file)?

The PLOS Data policy requires authors to make all data underlying the findings described in their manuscript fully available without restriction, with rare exception. 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

**********

5. Is the manuscript presented in an intelligible fashion and written in standard English?

PLOS Sustainability and Transformation 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

**********

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: The authors have done an excellent job addressing my previous comments and those of other reviewers. I deeply appreciate the effort they have put into revising the manuscript and considering the significant improvements. I'm pleased to recommend the paper for publication. Also, I'm confident that in its current form, the work will be much better received and understood by readers.

That said, I noticed that the figures in the submitted manuscript are difficult to read, which seems to be a technical issue. I trust the editorial team will ensure the figures are published in high resolution.

Additionally, while the authors have addressed the topic of so-called "side effects" (e.g., mosquitos, pesticides, etc.) in their response, and I agree that these are beyond the scope of the current study, it might be worthwhile to include a brief note cautioning readers about such potential consequences, which, although outside the current study's remit, deserve attention in future research. It is not uncommon for seemingly minor issues to grow into significant challenges.

However, I want to emphasize that this is not a critique that would warrant rejection of the current version of the manuscript.

The authors have also done a commendable job addressing several limitations of their study in the discussion section. While these limitations exist, the study provides a strong foundation for similar investigations considering different geographic conditions and plant species in other regions.

Reviewer #2: (No Response)

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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.

Do you want your identity to be public for this peer review? If you choose “no”, your identity will remain anonymous but your review may still be made public.

For information about this choice, including consent withdrawal, please see our Privacy Policy .

Reviewer #1: Yes:  Rostyslav Sipakov

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.]

Figure resubmission:

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. If there are other versions of figure files still present in your submission file inventory at resubmission, please replace them with the PACE-processed versions.

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Impact of Green Wall Orientation on Building Energy Performance in a Tropical Climate: An Experimental Assessment

PSTR-D-24-00039R2

Dear DR Jayasooriya,

We are pleased to inform you that your manuscript 'Impact of Green Wall Orientation on Building Energy Performance in a Tropical Climate: An Experimental Assessment' has been provisionally accepted for publication in PLOS Sustainability and Transformation.

Before your manuscript can be formally accepted you will need to complete some formatting changes, which you will receive in a follow-up email from a member of our team. 

Please note that your manuscript will not be scheduled for publication until you have made the required changes, so a swift response is appreciated.

IMPORTANT: The editorial review process is now complete. PLOS will only permit corrections to spelling, formatting or significant scientific errors from this point onwards. Requests for major changes, or any which affect the scientific understanding of your work, will cause delays to the publication date of your manuscript.

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 SustainTransform@plos.org.

Thank you again for supporting Open Access publishing; we are looking forward to publishing your work in PLOS Sustainability and Transformation.

Best regards,

Jinkyu Hong

Academic Editor

PLOS Sustainability and Transformation

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Additional Editor Comments (if provided):

Reviewer Comments (if any, and for reference):