Impacts of Future Sea-Level Rise under Global Warming Assessed from Tide Gauge Records: A Case Study of the East Coast Economic Region of Peninsular Malaysia

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

no

Author Response

Land MDPI

Manuscripts Title: Impacts of future sea-level rise under global warming assessed from tide gauge records: a case study in the East Coast Economic Region of Peninsular Malaysia

Manuscript ID: land-1478457 

Dear Editor: Milos llic

We are grateful for the chance to revise the text that you have provided us. The reviewers deserve special thanks for paying close attention to an earlier version of the work.

We worked hard to update, edit, and rewrite the document to increase the quality of the study and its presentation in the updated version. We've made changes to the manuscript based on the reviewer's comments, and the full list of changes is below:

Reviewer 1 (R1)

Author’s Response: Thank you for your time and consideration in leaving a remark. Your proposal was taken into consideration. The complete document has been updated and improved in terms of English language and style editing.

The journal has requested that the paper be resubmitted. We are certain that it now satisfies your high criteria, and we hope that it will be accepted for publishing in your esteemed journal.

Sincerely yours

Milad Bagheri Ghadikolaei Ph.D.

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Reviewer 2 Report

The reviewed manuscript deals with a highly-interesting and internationally-important issue. It is both methodological and case-study paper. This is example of significant methodological advance. The study itself is really in-depth. I hope my recommendations will permit to refining of this work.

• The paper is full of important technical details, which is appreciated. However, it is not so easy to detect the central message. For instance, do I understand correctly that you have used the pre-2013 data to make predictions for 2013-2020, and then you compared these predictions to what has been observed in fact? Please, try to make clarifications where possible, including Abstract, Introduction, and Conclusions.
• I think that the study area should be characterized with more details and references.
• You need to distribute better the portions of the knowledge between the Materials and Methods, Results, and Discussion. At least, all findings should be separated from interpretations and methodological notes.
• Subsection 4.3 should be enlarged in regard to the findings of the present study and the potential for this model for making forecasts for the 2020s.
• All figures should be enlarged to make all details well-visible.

Author Response

Land MDPI

Manuscripts Title: Impacts of future sea-level rise under global warming assessed from tide gauge records: a case study in the East Coast Economic Region of Peninsular Malaysia 

Manuscript ID: land-1478457 

Dear Editor: Milos llic

We are grateful for the chance to revise the text that you have provided us. The reviewers deserve special thanks for paying close attention to an earlier version of the work.

We worked hard to update, edit, and rewrite the document to increase the quality of the study and its presentation in the updated version. We've made changes to the manuscript based on the reviewer's comments, and the full list of changes is below:

Reviewer 2 (R2)

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

The reviewed manuscript deals with a highly-interesting and internationally-important issue. It is both methodological and case-study paper. This is example of significant methodological advance. The study itself is really in-depth. I hope my recommendations will permit to the refining of this work.

1. The paper is full of important technical details, which is appreciated. However, it is not so easy to detect the central message. For instance, do I understand correctly that you have used the pre-2013 data to make predictions for 2013-2020, and then you compared these predictions to what has been observed in fact? Please, try to make clarifications where possible, including Abstract, Introduction, and Conclusions.

• Author’s Response: Many thanks for your kind comment and question about the manuscript.
• After doing some time-series statistical analysis and normalizing the data, we employ observed sea level data from 1991 to 2013 as one of the climatic input dada in the ANN model. The FNN determines the optimum model architecture for sea-level prediction between 2013 to 2020 in the ANN after Machin learning using the specific algorithm.
• Some parts of the document, such as the abstract, introduction, and conclusions, have been revised and enhanced. Please see pages 1,2 and 12 for further information.

2. I think that the study area should be characterized with more details and references.

• Author’s Response: Thank you very much for your nice words on the manuscript.
• We have defined further specifications under the study area section.
• Please see pages 4 and 5 for further information.

3. You need to distribute better the portions of the knowledge between the Materials and Methods, Results, and Discussion. At least, all findings should be separated from interpretations and methodological notes.

• Author’s Response: Thank you so much for taking the time to respond so thoughtfully.
• We separated sections of the data more clearly and separated the conclusions from interpretations and methodological comments.
• Pages 10 and 11 are referred to.

4. Subsection 4.3 should be enlarged in regard to the findings of the present study and the potential for this model for making forecasts for the 2020s.

• Author’s Response: Thank you for your thoughtful comments and questions on the text.
• In light of the current study's findings, we've expanded Subsection 4.3.
• Please see page 12 for further information.

5. All figures should be enlarged to make all details well-visible.

• Author’s Response: Thank you for taking the time to leave a comment. Your suggestion was implemented. The entire manuscript has been revised and enhanced.
• We have enlarged to make all details well-visible.
• Please refer to pages 3,4,5 and 7,8,9,10.

• The journal has requested that the paper be resubmitted. We are certain that it now satisfies your high criteria, and we hope that it will be accepted for publishing in your esteemed journal.

Sincerely yours

Milad Bagheri Ghadikolaei Ph.D.

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Reviewer 3 Report

Interesting study on a timely topic, related to sea-level prediction.

One major problem is one missing paper, namely: Bagheri, M., Zaiton Ibrahim, Z., Bin Mansor, S. et al. Shoreline change analysis and erosion prediction using historical data of Kuala Terengganu, Malaysia. Environ Earth Sci 78, 477 (2019). https://0-doi-org.brum.beds.ac.uk/10.1007/s12665-019-8459-x

This paper is not mentioned in literature but is very important to judge the novelty and compare results of the new contribution. As far I could see the data used in both papers are related to the same period of time and the same region of Malaysia. What is different is the analysis method and the objective (but shoreline erosion and sea level are somewhat related). In the paper form 2019 a Bruun model was used and in the present submission a ANN was applied

Major deficiency is lack of proper evaluation of the results, proper discussion and comparison to other results form similar publications- in general the ANN study was performed, but what conclusions draw the authors is difficult to find.

Descriptions of the ANN training and partial results is much too long: there is nothing new in this part: additionally standard screens from a well-known Matlab toolbox are shown , without any usefullness for final results.

Author Response

Land MDPI

Manuscripts Title: Impacts of future sea-level rise under global warming assessed from tide gauge records: a case study in the East Coast Economic Region of Peninsular Malaysia

Manuscript ID: land-1478457 

Dear Editor: Milos llic

We are grateful for the chance to revise the text that you have provided us. The reviewers deserve special thanks for paying close attention to an earlier version of the work.

We worked hard to update, edit, and rewrite the document to increase the quality of the study and its presentation in the updated version. We've made changes to the manuscript based on the reviewer's comments, and the full list of changes is below:

Reviewer 3 (R3)

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

Interesting study on a timely topic, related to sea-level prediction.

One major problem is one missing paper, namely: Bagheri, M., Zaiton Ibrahim, Z., Bin Mansor, S. et al. Shoreline change analysis and erosion prediction using historical data of Kuala Terengganu, Malaysia. Environ Earth Sci 78, 477 (2019). https://0-doi-org.brum.beds.ac.uk/10.1007/s12665-019-8459-x. This paper is not mentioned in literature but is very important to judge the novelty and compare results of the new contribution. As far I could see the data used in both papers are related to the same period of time and the same region of Malaysia.

1. What is different is the analysis method and the objective (but shoreline erosion and sea level are somewhat related). In the paper form 2019 a Bruun model was used and in the present submission a ANN was applied. Major deficiency is lack of proper evaluation of the results, proper discussion and comparison to other results form similar publications- in general the ANN study was performed, but what conclusions draw the authors is difficult to find.

Author’s Response: Thank you for your thoughtful comment and inquiry regarding the manuscript.

• In a work from 2019, a Bruun model was employed, however, this model was only utilized for predicting shoreline erosion, but in the present publication, ANN only used time-series data to forecast sea level, which is a different issue, approach, and data. As a result, the two articles are completely different in terms of content and data collecting.
• The Bruun model is exclusively utilized for sandy beach areas and is a two-dimensional model for shoreline erosion prediction (Bagheri 2019).
• We can apply the ANN model with any form of time series data in any study field. Please see line 141 on page 11 of the document.
• We only utilized the ANN findings (sea-level rise 2013 to 2020) as a primary factor in the Bruun model in the 2019 article:  (Bagheri 2019)
• Both models aren't the same when it comes to projecting sea-level rise or shoreline erosion, which makes comparison and debate difficult. Both models have completely different inputs and types of data.
• In general, the ANN study was carried out, with discussion and comparison to other results from comparable publications. Please see line 231 on page 12 of the paper.

2. Descriptions of the ANN training and partial results are much too long: there is nothing new in this part: additionally standard screens from a well-known Matlab toolbox are shown, without any usefullness for final results.

Author’s Response: Thank you for your time and consideration in leaving a remark. Your comment was taken into consideration. The manuscript as a whole has been updated and improved.

• In the result and discussion section, we used standard screens from a well-known Matlab toolbox as output and FNN result, and in the simulation section, we found the best FNN model architecture based on this standard screen, and in the sea level rise prediction section, we used the simulation FNN model architecture and the base of this model simulation that is different for each tide gauge station. This simulation is for the east coast of Malaysia, and it is used for five tidal gauge stations. While the model and procedure are the same, the model run for each tide gauge station is different. Please see pages 2,3 and 6 of the paper.
• We found a specific simulation article FNN model using climatic data for five tide gauge stations on the east coast of Malaysia (We can only use this simulation results for the east coast of Malaysia) and we predict sea-level rise for five tide gauge stations on the east coast of Malaysia using this FNN simulation learning. This is the study's principal finding.
• In response to the Review comments, we revised and improved the discussion and conclusion. Please see pages 10,11 and 12 of the paper.
• The project's report and findings were submitted to the related Malaysian department and agency.

• The journal has requested that the paper be resubmitted. We are certain that it now satisfies your high criteria, and we hope that it will be accepted for publishing in your esteemed journal.

Sincerely yours

Milad Bagheri Ghadikolaei Ph.D.

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Round 2

Reviewer 3 Report

The authors answered correctly to my concerns and improved the paper sufficiently to justify the publication.