Global scenarios of irrigation water abstractions  for bioenergy production: a systematic review

Stenzel, Fabian; Gerten, Dieter; Hanasaki, Naota

doi:https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-25-1711-2021

Articles | Volume 25, issue 4

https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-25-1711-2021

© Author(s) 2021. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.

https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-25-1711-2021

© Author(s) 2021. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.

Articles | Volume 25, issue 4

Review article

|

06 Apr 2021

Review article |

| 06 Apr 2021

Global scenarios of irrigation water abstractions for bioenergy production: a systematic review

Fabian Stenzel, Dieter Gerten, and Naota Hanasaki

Download

Final revised paper (published on 06 Apr 2021)
Preprint (discussion started on 06 Jul 2020)

Interactive discussion

Status: closed

AC: Author comment | RC: Referee comment | SC: Short comment | EC: Editor comment

- Printer-friendly version

- Supplement

RC1: 'Suggestions to be considered in a Revised Version', David Ellison, 13 Aug 2020
- AC1: 'Response to reviewer comment', Fabian Stenzel, 07 Sep 2020
SC1: 'Review', Mohamad Hejazi, 17 Aug 2020
RC2: 'Review report see pdf', Anonymous Referee #2, 21 Aug 2020
- AC4: 'Response to reviewer comment', Fabian Stenzel, 07 Sep 2020
EC1: 'Start interactiong with referees and discussant', Nunzio Romano, 21 Aug 2020
RC3: 'Review of hess-2020-338', John King, 24 Aug 2020
- AC3: 'Response to reviewer comment', Fabian Stenzel, 07 Sep 2020
RC4: 'hess-2020-338', Mohamad Hejazi, 24 Aug 2020
- AC2: 'Response to reviewer comment', Fabian Stenzel, 07 Sep 2020

Peer-review completion

AR: Author's response | RR: Referee report | ED: Editor decision

ED: Reconsider after major revisions (further review by editor and referees) (15 Nov 2020) by Nunzio Romano

AR by Fabian Stenzel on behalf of the Authors (17 Nov 2020) Author's response Manuscript

ED: Referee Nomination & Report Request started (28 Nov 2020) by Nunzio Romano

RR by Anonymous Referee #2 (25 Dec 2020)

RR by John King (31 Dec 2020)

Suggestions for revision or reasons for rejection

General comments:
Overall, the manuscript writing and data analysis/interpretation have greatly improved in response to comments provided by the four reviewers. The authors have done a good job of responding to my previous individual comments, changing the manuscript in substantive and obvious ways. In particular, it is now more clear what new contributions are being made here compared to the reviewed literature. In addition, consideration of irrigation of BPs has changed from what seemed a (unintentional) view towards advocacy to a more objective consideration in light of economic and environmental sustainability. In addition, inclusion of new analyses of bioenergy water use efficiency (or iwue) has provided a means of study inter-comparison, bringing forth important new insights. There are numerous grammatical corrections needed to this second draft, which I have attempted to point out in specific comments below. Overall, this is now an important contribution to the literature on the water use implications of a widespread bioenergy industry, and can be considered for publication after further minor revisions.

Specfic comments:
Abstract
P1 L2: Change “or” to “and”.
P1 L5: Delete “such”.
P1 L6: Change “for” to “of”.
P2 Table 1: Should “iwue” be added to the list?

Introduction
P2 L28: Replace “plants’ ” with “plant”.
P2 L29: Suggest replacing “is consumed from the soils” with “transferred from soil to the atmosphere in the process of evapotranspiration”.
P2 L31: Delete “for”.
P2 L34: Replace “pure” with “ligno-cellulosic”.
P3 L45: Replace “purely” with “completely”; suggest removing parentheses.
P3 L48: Change “on” to “of”.
P3 L62: Change “did so far not provide” with “have so far not provided”.
P4 L81: Change “on” to “of”.
P4 L84: Change “to deal with it as a component of the hydrological cycle” to “quantified as a component of the hydrologic cycle”.

Methods
P4 L91: Change “focus” to “focused”.
P5 L101: Change “is” to “are”. Recommend moving Table 2 to appear after the text on L101.
P5 L103 to L131: Addition of “iwue” and “biomass harvest from energy” conversions in response to my previous comments provides strong conceptual unification and standardized means of comparison of the reviewed studies, and is an excellent contribution.

Results and Discussion
P7 L135: Insert comma after “abstractions”.
P7 L143: Insert comma after “interactions”.
P7 L155: Consider changing “found studies” to “studies targeted in this review”.
P8 L163: Consider changing “An objective of future studies should be” to “A useful objective of future studies would be”.
P8 L166: Consider changing the last sentence of the paragraph (“The…”) to “However, the current review is timely since information on the relative magnitudes of green and blue water demands of large-scale bioenergy implementation, relative to other social and environmental needs, is needed now for the best decision-making and policy development.” (or something similar that sounds less prescriptive)
P8 L170: Change “use” to “uses”.
P8 L172: Change “on” to “of”.
P8 L182: Change “type” to “types”.
P9 L192: Delete “an”.
P9 L200: Insert comma after “(2014)”.
P10 L228: The meaning of “(non-)renewable” is unclear. Please rephrase/be more specific for clarity.
P11, L246: Suggest rephrasing “Major impacts…” to “However, in the context of the current review, major impacts…”.
P11 L250: Delete “however”.
P11 L263: Perhaps a picky technical comment, but carbon sequestered during BECCS is not “removed” from the carbon cycle, rather it is moved from fluxes of the cycle to (hopefully) long-term pools.
P11 L273: Insert comma after “Additionally”.
P12 L292: Delete comma after “Runoff”; “appropriation” should be plural.
P12 L296: List the “other main sectors” being discussed for the reader, referencing Figure 2.
P12 L307: Insert “use” after “water”.
P14 L310: Are “municipality” and “domestic” the same? Be consistent with terminology for clarity.
P14 L311: “withdrawal” should be plural.
P14 L315: Change “by” to “through”; insert “withdrawals” after “industrial”.
P14 L328: Recommend re-structuring sentence: Insert period after “(Hanasaki et al., 2013a)”, begin new sentence “Importantly, integrative studies…lacking.”
P14 L330: Inclusion of economic considerations and water use of other sectors is a useful/necessary addition to this draft of the analysis. Excellent.
P14 L337: Change “10” to “10.0”.
P15 L349: Insert “are” after “values”.
P15 L355 to 358: Excellent new insights derived from iwue analysis.
P15 L359: Insert “a” after “Only”.
P15 L361: Change “on-field” to “in-field”.
P15 L371: Insert “necessary” before “parameters”; suggest inserting “needed for a full assessment of the hydrologic implications of widespread BP deployment.” after “publications”.
P15 L372: Change “irrigation” to “water use (including irrigation)”.
P16 L376: Change “assumed in” to “estimated from”.
P16 L377: Change “128.4” to “128”; correct typo “1.100” to “1,100”.
P16 L386: Insert “publication” before “time”.
P16 L396: Change “would tamper with” to “could affect”.

Hide

RR by David Ellison (06 Jan 2021)

ED: Publish subject to minor revisions (review by editor) (12 Jan 2021) by Nunzio Romano

AR by Fabian Stenzel on behalf of the Authors (18 Jan 2021) Author's response Author's tracked changes Manuscript

ED: Publish as is (31 Jan 2021) by Nunzio Romano

Short summary

Ideas to mitigate climate change include the large-scale cultivation of fast-growing plants to capture atmospheric CO₂ in biomass. To maximize the productivity of these plants, they will likely be irrigated. However, there is strong disagreement in the literature on how much irrigation water is needed globally, potentially inducing water stress. We provide a comprehensive overview of global irrigation demand studies for biomass production and discuss the diverse underlying study assumptions.