Current Status of and Challenges for Phytoremediation as a Sustainable Environmental Management Plan for Abandoned Mine Areas in Korea
Round 1
Reviewer 1 Report
Considering the overall merit of the article, I found it quite exciting and intriguing. As we are working towards a better environment with cost-efficient implementations, the idea of phytoremediation is essential for the readers to learn about.
Your abstract was clear and straightforward.
The introduction provides sufficient background. The important point here is that conventional strategies are not sufficient or efficient enough and therefore, phytoremediation is important. The introduction provides this idea clearly.
There are some questions:
- Certain sections indicate that this approach is quite suitable. Considering the article in general, it sounds like the idea is feasible. However, why do we not talk about this approach more frequently (just staying at 59%)? Is it primarily related to policies and regulations in Korea or other parts of the world where they don't implement this approach? Can it be due to other approaches providing a better yield? Please explain so.
- Certain active or abandoned mining areas cause environmental pollution. That is clear. Do we have any insight as to what type of mine provides the worst pollution? Did I miss the information somewhere? If not, indicating such, perhaps providing a comparison would be beneficial. Is coal worse than other types of mines?
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You conclusions are clear with future work indicated.
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Author Response
- Certain sections indicate that this approach is quite suitable. Considering the article in general, it sounds like the idea is feasible. However, why do we not talk about this approach more frequently (just staying at 59%)? Is it primarily related to policies and regulations in Korea or other parts of the world where they don't implement this approach? Can it be due to other approaches providing a better yield? Please explain so.
Re) The fact that phytoremediation is not well utilized in Korea and a significant part of developing countries can be attributed to the fact that they are not yet sufficiently prepared in terms of technology and policy.
- Certain active or abandoned mining areas cause environmental pollution. That is clear. Do we have any insight as to what type of mine provides the worst pollution? Did I miss the information somewhere? If not, indicating such, perhaps providing a comparison would be beneficial. Is coal worse than other types of mines?
Re) Strictly speaking, it cannot be said that the harmful environment resulting from mining is severe in a specific mine. It is common for coal mines and metal mines to produce hazardous substances such as acid mine drainage and heavy metals.
Reviewer 2 Report
Manuscript is well written with only a few suggested changes. English is good and easily readable.
Line 97. If the harvestable waste are "incinerated", won't that just respread the TTEs?
Line 102-103. The text states "leach into groundwater or agricultural land". Leach into groundwater is fine but into agricultural land? Would that more likely be runoff onto agricultural land?
Line 183. "the leaching effects" suggest adding "and runoff".
Line 194. "artificial" may not be right word here. Artificial gives the impression of plastic plants that you have in your home. Perhaps, "non-native" is a better choice.
Lines 315-317. Is there a reason this sentence is a separate paragraph? Could easily combine with prior paragraph.
Author Response
Line 97. If the harvestable waste are "incinerated", won't that just respread the TTEs?
Re) Extracting contaminants or useful substances from biomass (harvested plant) that accumulates contaminants is called biomining. It is accepted that this is unlikely to lead to the spread of contamination.
Line 102-103. The text states "leach into groundwater or agricultural land". Leach into groundwater is fine but into agricultural land? Would that more likely be runoff onto agricultural land?
Re) We took your advice and rewrote it to "leach into groundwater or spread to agricultural land". Please check the revised manuscript.
Line 183. "the leaching effects" suggest adding "and runoff".
Re) We changed “leaching” to “leaching and runoffs”
Line 194. "artificial" may not be right word here. Artificial gives the impression of plastic plants that you have in your home. Perhaps, "non-native" is a better choice.
Re) We took your advice and changed artificial to “non-native”. Please check the revised manuscript.
Lines 315-317. Is there a reason this sentence is a separate paragraph? Could easily combine with prior paragraph.
Re) We combined lines 315-317 with previous paragraph.
Reviewer 3 Report
This article reviewed the approach of phytoremediation in Korea particularly at abandoned mining site of metal/metalloid. All figures are acceptable to express the concepts of different phtoremediation goals, but why not adding one or more tables with metal/metalloid data in soil and plant (root or shoot) to highlight the quantitative efficiency of phytoremediation because I suppose these data are available in Korea.
Please cite data of metal concentrations in soils and plants before and after phytoextraction and phytostabilization in Korea to support their remediation efficiency quantitatively for this manuscript as one or two tables.
Author Response
This article reviewed the approach of phytoremediation in Korea particularly at abandoned mining site of metal/metalloid. All figures are acceptable to express the concepts of different phtoremediation goals, but why not adding one or more tables with metal/metalloid data in soil and plant (root or shoot) to highlight the quantitative efficiency of phytoremediation because I suppose these data are available in Korea. Please cite data of metal concentrations in soils and plants before and after phytoextraction and phytostabilization in Korea to support their remediation efficiency quantitatively for this manuscript as one or two tables.
Re) We added data (Table 3) related to aided phytostabilization in the form of a table. The data showed that the concentration of CaCl2 extractable metals in tailing was reduced by plant planting and amendment treatment. Please refer to the revised manuscript.
