Responses to reviews in the open discussion would appear to satisfy reviewer concerns. If a suitably revised manuscript is submitted as suggested in the response letters, the paper is likely to be acceptable for publication in Biogeosciences. The revised version should (1) clarify the equations and method adopting the half time step approach; (2) underscore how the use of TEM may differ from a similar application with more complex models; (3) include a discussion, as in the response to R2, about the spin-up time achieved for TEM and how it relates to what would be achieved for applications to more complex models such as CASA and Century; (4) clarify the terminology for LU; (5) re-iterate that the application seeks an annual steady state for a cyclo-stationary, monthly time step model rather than a monthly steady state; (6) additional details on applications at other sites listed in Table 1, and the proposed revisions to Table 2.