Assessing the Area of Suitable Land for Climate Change Mitigation with Sitka Spruce (Picea sitchensis) in Scotland

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

The article examines climate change mitigation. It is a highly interesting topic, particularly under the devastating effects of the climate crisis.

In the title it would be better to replace the word land with forest?

Line 22. Despite the scientific studies the author should mention the results of the report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC, 2021). You have a reference to the IPCC but not clearly stated in the introduction. The reviewer thinks that it would be useful for the readers. For instance, “The Sixth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) highlighted that extreme precipitation events will become more frequent while drought magnitude will increase, in the near-future period over Europe (IPCC, 2021).

IPCC. Climate Change 2021: The physical science basis. In Contribution of Working Group, I to the Sixth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change; Cambridge University Press: Cambridge, UK, 2021.

Line 51. To that end, accurate future climate projections are necessary for forest ecosystems. On the contrary, models performance highly influenced in areas with complex terrain as the natural/forest ecosystems (Stefanidis. 2021; Tolika 2016)

Stefanidis, S. (2021). Ability of Different Spatial Resolution Regional Climate Model to Simulate Air Temperature in a Forest Ecosystem of Central Greece. J. Environ. Prot. Ecol, 22, 1488-1495.

Tolika, K., Anagnostopoulou, C., Velikou, K., & Vagenas, C. (2016). A comparison of the updated very high-resolution model RegCM3_10km with the previous version RegCM3_25km over the complex terrain of Greece: present and future projections. Theoretical and applied climatology, 126(3), 715-726.

Line 55, Line 72. Follow the journal instructions for the references in the article’s main text.

Line 71. Highlight the importance of the ecosystem services provided by forest ecosystems.

Line 143. Please briefly mention the data or give a table.

Line 159. The table format is not in line with journal instructions for authors. Please check and revise the article.

Line 286. In figure 3 add a base map (eg. Satellite Image, google image) with labels of the surrounding areas. Make this change in all maps given in this study.

Give some direction for future research based on the current approach.

 

 

 

Author Response

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Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Reviewer 2 Report

Dear authors,

I have had the pleasure to examine your paper entitled "Assessing the area of suitable land for climate change mitigation with Sitka spruce in Scotland". I found overall the paper interesting, and the methodlogy quite sound. I believe the paper has potential for publication in the Land Journal.

However, I also believe some parts of the manuscript can be clearly improved. My major comment refers to the quite "opaque" indicators which were used to evaluate the land suitability. Even though (web)platforms implementing the calculations were used, the details regarding these indices should be clearly presented (with formulas, if applicable). Besides, new additional information is also required in some parts of the manuscript, for which I have provided comments in the manuscript attached.

I suggest Minor Revision.

Comments for author File: Comments.pdf

Author Response

Please see the attachment

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Reviewer 3 Report

Dear Authors,

In my opinion the submitted manuscript titled „Assessing the area of suitable land for climate change mitigation with Sitka spruce in Scotland” presents the valuable results. Despite of growing scientific interest in problem of climate warming the present state of knowledge is still insufficient. Therefore the presented findings might interest the international audience. However, I have found some imperfections, which in my opinion should be corrected or clarified before an eventual publication. They are listed below:

1.            I suggest to add the latin name  Picea sitchensis in title.

2.            I think that reasons of choice of Sitka spruce ( lines 116-123) might be moved into chapter Introduction. At the same time, the short characteristics of a study species (range, habitat conditions, life span) should be added in chapter Material and methods.

3.            In my opinion the presentation of outcomes should be more concise. There is no need to mention the same data in the text and in the Tables or Figures (e.g. value „999,234” in  lines 303 and 308 or „13%” in Line 303 and in Figure 5a).

4.            The chapter Conclusions looks like a summary. In my opinion the should contain main conclusion from performed investigations and present the possibile future directions of studies.

5.            Figures 2, 4, 5, 6, 7 are illegible (the font is too small). Moreover, the Tables should be self-explanatory; the meaning of  abreviations should be explained in captions.

6.            I encourage Authors to look into the below listed papers. Perhaps some of them will be suitable in an eventual manuscript corrections.

·         Black, K., Bolger, T., Davis, P. et al. Inventory and eddy covariance-based estimates of annual carbon sequestration in a Sitka spruce (Picea sitchensis (Bong.) Carr.) forest ecosystem. Eur J Forest Res 126, 167–178 (2007).

·         Julii Brainard, Andrew Lovett, Ian Bateman, Sensitivity analysis in calculating the social value of carbon sequestered in British grown Sitka spruce, Journal of Forest Economics, 12,3, 201-228(2006).

·         Terhi Kaipainen, Jari Liski, Ari Pussinen, Timo Karjalainen,Managing carbon sinks by changing rotation length in European forests, Environmental Science & Policy, 7, 3, 205-219 (2004)

·         Peipei Zhang, Nate G McDowell, Xuhui Zhou, Wenzhi Wang, Riley T Leff, Alexandria L Pivovaroff, Hongxia Zhang, Pak S Chow, Nicholas D Ward, Julia Indivero, Steven B Yabusaki, Scott Waichler, Vanessa L Bailey, Declining carbohydrate content of Sitka-spruce treesdying from seawater exposure, Plant Physiology, Volume 185, Issue 4, April 2021, Pages 1682–1696

·         Georgios Xenakis, Adam Ash, Lukas Siebicke, Mike Perks, James I.L. Morison, Comparison of the carbon, water, and energy balances of mature stand and clear-fell stages in a British Sitka spruce forest and the impact of the 2018 drought,Agricultural and Forest Meteorology, Volume 306,2021,108437.

Author Response

Please see the attachment

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Round 2

Reviewer 1 Report

The article improved from the previous version. However, the following suggestion not included. The authors said that they did not undrestand the comment. I give some information herein. The suggestion is to  add the comments so as to give a view for the need/difficulties of the of accurate future climate projections in mountainous ecosystems.

Stefanidis, S. (2021). Ability of Different Spatial Resolution Regional Climate Model to Simulate Air Temperature in a Forest Ecosystem of Central Greece. J. Environ. Prot. Ecol, 22, 1488-1495.   Tolika, K., Anagnostopoulou, C., Velikou, K., & Vagenas, C. (2016). A co