Reply to the 'Comment on Cage occupancy of methane clathrate hydrates in the ternary H 2 O-NH 3 -CH 4 system' by S. Alavi and J. Ripmeester, Chem. Commun. , 2022, 58 , DOI: 10.1039/D1CC06526B.

Our recent Communication suggested that ammonia in aqueous solution may preferentially destabilize large cages in methane clathrate hydrates. A Comment favored ammonia incorporation instead, but it did not accurately describe our proposed mechanism and relied primarily on studies conducted in different chemical systems and/or which used other preparation methods.