Effects of Thermal Discharge from Coastal Nuclear Power Plants and Thermal Power Plants on the Thermocline Characteristics in Sea Areas with Different Tidal Dynamics

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

This paper mainly studied the nearshore thermocline variations for the areas outside of coastal nuclear power plants. If the authors wanted to show the importance of their study to the nearshore stratification and thus ecosystem, they also need to provide at least some discussion on the effect of salinity variation induced by power plant discharge on sea water density (stratification) variation. Both temperature and salinity are the key elements for evaluating sea water density (stratification) change.

The sentence at Line 52-53 “However, there have been few studies …” should be modified to provide more details on what in specific need to be further studied.

Replace “0.5 h” at Line 72 and “0.2 h” at Line 73 with specific words.

Author Response

Please see the attachment

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Reviewer 2 Report

attached.

Comments for author File: Comments.pdf

Author Response

Please see the attachment

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Round 2

Reviewer 1 Report

The authors’ response “the change in salinity induced by the thermal discharge from CNATPP is only minor” is probably true. But the change in density (stratification) can also be induced by the change in salinity unless you show some evidence that salinity does not change significantly with tidal dynamics. If the authors currently don't have salinity data, the authors should at least add some discussion about salinity-induced density variations.

Author Response

Please see the attachment

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Round 3

Reviewer 1 Report

The authors added useful data and discussion to make their approach more completed.

Author Response

Please see the attachment.

Author Response File: Author Response.docx