Response to 'Stochastic and deterministic interpretation of pool models'.

We concur with Azizi-Rad et al. (2021) that it is vital to critically evaluate and compare different soil carbon models, and we welcome the opportunity to further describe the unique contribution of the PROMISE model (Waring et al. 2020) to this literature. The PROMISE framework does share many features with established biogeochemical models, as our original manuscript highlighted in Table 1, and our work builds upon model innovations developed by many different groups, including that of Azizi-Rad and colleagues. Yet, the PROMISE framework is distinctive due to where it places mechanistic emphasis, and how these mechanisms are formalized in the mathematical model structure.