Jan Rosenow responds to Richard Lorch’s End of an Era editorial.
BRI is a journal that stands out. It impresses for its high quality, depth and breadth of topics. It was Richard Lorch who played a major role in making what BRI is today – a prestigious international journal where academics and professionals present their original work on buildings to a global audience. I am proud to have published in this journal and have recommended it to fellow academics many times.
Richard’s exemplary role as an editor can be demonstrated by my first interaction with Richard in 2015 when we submitted an article on energy efficiency and the policy mix drawing on data from a pan-European study. Until that point, my experience with editors had been mixed, ranging from disengaged to diligent. Richard, however, stood out as an editor who not only facilitated the review and publishing process effectively, but actively engaged with the substance of what we had submitted. He had read our article and the reviewers’ comments very carefully and synthesised lengthy and dense comments from four reviewers in such a way that gave us clear direction. This was not easy as there were conflicting comments and the reviewers disagreed on the direction we should take the article. It was for Richard’s ability to identify the key issues we needed to address and those comments we could pay less attention to. I have never come across an editor who engaged with the authors so actively and provided such direction.
It is with great disappointment that I learned about his dismissal as the editor and the subsequent resignation of the entire editorial board. This could well be the end of BRI as a truly outstanding journal. It can only be hoped that the publisher reconsiders its decision and makes the right decision which is to continue Richard Lorch’s service to be the editor of BRI.
Dr Jan Rosenow is the European Director at the Regulatory Assistance Project (RAP), a global team of energy experts. He is an Honorary Research Fellow at Oxford University, Associate Faculty at SPRU, Sussex University and a Research Associate at the Free University of Berlin.
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