Decision Support Tool for Electric Power Generation Development: A Feasibility Analysis for a Nigerian Case
Round 1
Reviewer 1 Report
I congratulate the authors for their article entitled “Decision Support Tool for Electric Power Generation Development: A Feasibility Analysis for a Nigerian Case” which aims to develop a tool that can provide policymakers with valuable insights for long-term investment decisions and facilitate the delivery of low-cost, clean energy to developing countries.
I have the following comments and observations:
* Keywords - what does "Electricity Energy" mean?
* Try to review the paper under the writing requirements of the journal - say where the authors are coming from - It cannot be understood if 1 or all are from that university;
* Try to put the references in order (line 23 - it should be [1]-[3]) etc.;
* For figures' sources, even if your contribution, it should be stated where did you take your data from;
* Figures 2, 3, 4 etc..... don't have sources...;
* You have to review the paper as it has errors - lines 181-183 "Error! Reference source not found. shows the process flow for the model developed in this study, and Error! Reference source not found. depicts the logic used to design the load modelling tool in MATLAB using the MATPOWER tool." - the same with lines 156, 165, 189, 208-209, 219, 253-254, 260.
* the "Related Work" section I think should be "Literature review"
* Regarding the entire analysis, there are sections where there is a 20 years analysis (2001-2020), then sections with 20 years analysis (1990-2018 or 1990-2017), then references to the latest year 2016 - the entire paper should be about the same timeframe and now be broader or more condensed; if the information lacks from 2021, then there should be called for a limitation in the paper and everything should focus only on 2020 as the latest year;
* There is room for Limitations in the last part of your article;
* Please try to reread the paper and make the needed changes, in terms of language, easiness of reading, and flow of ideas (for example, there are too many subsections and there is a change in the ideas that are presented frequently, going from one topic to another; for example,lines123-125 - Participants were tasked with ranking nine distinct policies according to the electricity generation or supply growth they brought about in Nigeria between 2001 and 2020.).
Review it please
Author Response
Response to Reviewer 1
We thank the Reviewer for his appreciation, suggestions, and useful comments. We have carefully revised the manuscript following the Reviewers’ comments and we are now resubmitting the paper for consideration to publication.
Together with this document, we uploaded a pdf version of the revised paper with marked changes. More specifically, we marked in red all the parts of the manuscript that are new or were modified.
PREAMBLE
I congratulate the authors for their article entitled “Decision Support Tool for Electric Power Generation Development: A Feasibility Analysis for a Nigerian Case” which aims to develop a tool that can provide policymakers with valuable insights for long-term investment decisions and facilitate the delivery of low-cost, clean energy to developing countries. I have the following comments and observations:
Comment 1
* Keywords - what does "Electricity Energy" mean?
Response to Comment 1:
Electricity refers to power systems, I have replaced “Electricity” with “power systems” and removed “Energy” as there is another keyword that covers renewable energy.
Comment 2
* Try to review the paper under the writing requirements of the journal - say where the authors are coming from - It cannot be understood if 1 or all are from that university.
Response to Comment 2:
All Authors are from the London South Bank University and the text was adjusted to reflect this.
Comment 3
* Try to put the references in order (line 23 - it should be [1]-[3]) etc.
Response to Comment 3:
Updated refences in lines 23 and 89 in line with comment 3.
Comment 4
* For figures' sources, even if your contribution, it should be stated where did you take your data from;
Response to Comment 4:
Updated all figures to reflect their sources.
Comment 5
* Figures 2, 3, 4 etc..... don't have sources...;
Response to Comment 5:
Updated all figures to reflect their sources.
Comment 6
* You have to review the paper as it has errors - lines 181-183 "Error! Reference source not found. shows the process flow for the model developed in this study, and Error! Reference source not found. depicts the logic used to design the load modelling tool in MATLAB using the MATPOWER tool." - the same with lines 156, 165, 189, 208-209, 219, 253-254, 260.
Response to Comment 6:
These errors in the document have been rectified and highlighted in red text
Comment 7
* the "Related Work" section I think should be "Literature review"
Response to Comment 7:
Changed “Related work” to “Literature Review”.
Comment 8
* Regarding the entire analysis, there are sections where there is a 20 years analysis (2001-2020), then sections with 20 years analysis (1990-2018 or 1990-2017), then references to the latest year 2016 - the entire paper should be about the same timeframe and now be broader or more condensed; if the information lacks from 2021, then there should be called for a limitation in the paper and everything should focus only on 2020 as the latest year;
Response to Comment 8:
I have added the section below to the document in section 6 and moved the conclusion to section 7.
“Limitations of study
Subsequent studies could examine the impact of the policies on electricity storage in Nigeria as this study only examined the impacts on electricity generation and supply.
This study did not investigate funding availability for the proposed generation and transmission expansion projects. Future studies could look at how the policies have affected the availability of funding for these projects.
The modelling tool was created using IEEE 30 bus system as reliable load data from the Nigerian 330kV bus network was unavailable. Future studies could use data from the Nigerian case to build the tool and include the 132kV and 33kV transmission networks.
This study examined the impact of the policies between 2001 and 2020. Future studies could assess the impacts of current policies beyond this period.
In addition to these specific points, future studies could also look at other factors that have affected the development of the Nigerian electricity sector, such as the country's economic growth, political stability, and climate change.”
Comment 9
* There is room for Limitations in the last part of your article;
Response to Comment 9:
This section has been added to the document in section 6, before the conclusion.
Comment 10
* Please try to reread the paper and make the needed changes, in terms of language, easiness of reading, and flow of ideas (for example, there are too many subsections and there is a change in the ideas that are presented frequently, going from one topic to another; for example,lines123-125 - Participants were tasked with ranking nine distinct policies according to the electricity generation or supply growth they brought about in Nigeria between 2001 and 2020.).
Response to Comment 10:
These errors in the document have been rectified and highlighted in red text.
Author Response File: 
Author Response.pdf
Reviewer 2 Report
The paper presents a decision support tool for policymakers, which is inspired by the current status of the Nigerian energy sector. While the paper does have merits, the manuscript should be rigorously revised in order to improve its impact and relevance to readers. Some observations and suggestions are found below.
1. The main issue of the manuscript is that the methodological approach is not clear and should be presented in more concrete detail. The size of the sample of respondents seems to be 88 according to data from Figure 2, but it may be as high as 92 when considering Figure 5. The authors mention “research surveys” – was more than one survey conducted? Could you provide more details on the purpose and aim of these distinct surveys? What kind of data was collected during the face-to-face interviews and how was it incorporated in the study? Who were the participants in the surveys/interviews? How were they selected? When and how was the data collected? How relevant is the sample and what is its size? Can you provide more detail regarding some of the methods used, such as the Grounded Theory, Social Network Analysis and the Newton-Raphson method? Why were these used in the current study? How is the IEEE 30 bus system relevant of the current study? These are basic questions that are not always explicitly addressed, but in this case the description of the methodology is very generic and requires significantly more explanation.
2. The introduction should put more emphasis on the aim and the added value that the paper brings, compared to existing literature. The conclusion should explain how the tool can be used by policymakers and planners with no technical background – figures 11 – 15 could find their use in this context, as it is otherwise difficult to understand why screenshots from Microsoft Excel are relevant to readers.
3. The overall design and the structure of some figures makes them inadequate for publication. Figure 3 is fuzzy and difficult to read. Figure 5 seems to use a pie chart to illustrate responses from a question with multiple answers - the correct illustration in this case would be a bar chart where 100% is the maximum number of responses possible. Figures 3, 4 and 6 are dominated by the text of a survey question or a title in a large font, while the rest of the content is difficult to read. Most of the titles/captions of the figures are generic and irrelevant – they should be more descriptive and briefly present the essence of the information contained in the figure.
4. With regard to Figure 1, it makes no sense to combine per capita consumption values with overall electricity generation. The figure could be made relevant by expressing different metrics. Aside from using different colors for the two lines, different markers should also be used (i.e. square, diamond, or “x”, instead of circle) in order to make differences clear when printing out the paper in grayscale.
The paper is generally well written from an English language standpoint. Some minor errors that have been identified are:
Line 134 – “The results of other research show, as depicted in Figures”, Line 152 – “are laid out in Figure 5 according to the frequency with which the 152 occurrences occur”, Line 290 – “planners with no little or no technical background”.
There are numerous reference errors when mentioning figures – the text “Error! Reference not found.” is repeated throughout the manuscript.
Author Response
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Author Response File: Author Response.pdf
Reviewer 3 Report
Dear Authors,
This is an interesting piece and its focus on the global south is very useful. Of course, the MATPOWER tool developed at Cornell is already in use in over 100 nations, many from Africa, Latin America and Asia. So such an article must reach beyond the familiar to make a useful contribution. I believe your work begins to do so. However, the purpose of this submission is from the start not entirely clear. Realizing this I turn once again to your conclusions as noted below.
"Since 2001, several ambitious policies aimed at increasing the proportion of renewable energy, enhancing energy efficiency, and incorporating rural electrification have been issued; however, it is evident that a lack of political will has prevented most of these policies from being realised. Nonetheless, a few RE projects are currently in development in the country. A deterministic modelling tool referred to as the Decision Support Tool (DST) was developed in this study and was used to examine the Nigerian electricity policies from 2001 to 2020 to identify the least-cost electrification generation and supply option required to provide electricity to all areas of Nigeria by 2030. Future policymakers will be able to use this tool to model or extrapolate the potential effects of their ideas before committing to specific courses of action. Moreover, the software is accessible to even policymakers and planners with no little or no technical background."
If purpose is to present a DST founded on MATPOWER open source technology, then I would expect to find in these conclusions a more thoroughgoing summary and assessment of your DST, noting its value-added over rival and contemporaneous means. At the same time, I want to provide strong encouragement for you to make some adjustments to clarify your purpose and to summarize your findings. A more focussed description of your DST is thus in order, and the conclusions should make clear what you have achieved. Development of simple and accessible modelling approaches is of of course desirable. But at the same time the simplicity of these approaches will render their forecasts less reliable. At the same time, a higher order of reliability may be beyond reach given uncertainties and thin data sets on which to calibrate such models. The focus on Nigeria is most helpful and it is largely this focus that encourages me to recommend that you be afforded an opportunity to sharpen your analysis and clarify the value-added of your work. With these changes, I will be strongly inclined to recommend publication so I do wish to incentivize your ensuing efforts to improve the analysis. Lack of "political will" is not per see a sufficient conclusion, nor a logical result of your analysis.
Author Response
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Author Response File: Author Response.pdf
Round 2
Reviewer 1 Report
I see there were improvements done by the authors in terms of format but the paper still doesn't provide enough information on the discussion and conclusions part, validated by the results (other than lines 329-336). The limitations part that was added is a argument for the use of this kind of a tool and not about its limits "[...] it would provide future policymakers with the ability to perform robust analyses as they model or extrapolate the potential effects of their ideas before committing to specific courses of action. Moreover, the software is accessible to even policymakers and planners with no little or no technical background, without compromising on the quality of the output."
Author Response
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Author Response File: 
Author Response.docx
Reviewer 2 Report
The Authors have made clear improvements to the manuscript. Specific responses to reviewer comments would have made the second round of review more effective. As it stands, the manuscript seems adequate, although the Authors have still not fully considered the review comments in revising the methodology and, more significantly, the introduction.
The level of English is adequate.
Author Response
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Author Response File: Author Response.docx
Reviewer 3 Report
ok
minor
Author Response
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