The district description starts with a Tag District. The district contains all geometrical and physical information about the buildings in it. It is in the district tag that all the information can be found. It is a set of buildings. The District tag can contain at least 2 buildings and can be as big as a city. There are too many tags in the District to put them on this page. They are therefore dispatched in the following pages.

It is followed by far field obstruction profile, wall types, all building and finally ground surfaces.

In each Tag District there is a Tag FarFieldObstructions that contains the Far Field Obstructions as directions given by Points in azimuth and elevation.

<FarFieldObstructions> 
<Point phi="0.0" theta="2.0"/> 
<Point phi="10.0" theta="2.0"/> 
<Point phi="350.0" theta="2.0"/> 
<Point phi="360.0" theta="2.0"/> 
</FarFieldObstructions>

It defines a profile every 10° in azimuth with an elevation of 2° for the obstruction. The first angle defines a horizontal position and theta a vertical position. the bigger theta is, the more relief there is

In each Tag District there are as many Tags Composite as necessary for the simulation. Each composite contains the physical information about the walls, roofs and grounds: the layers from outside to inside and for each layer the name, the Thickness $\mathrm{(m)}$, thermal Conductivity $\mathrm{(W/(m \cdot K))}$, specific heat Cp $\mathrm{(J/(kg \cdot K))}$ and Density $\mathrm{(kg/m^3)}$.

<Composite id="7" name="Bale_1946-1960">
<Layer Thickness="0.02" Conductivity="0.87" Cp="1100.0" Density="1800.0"/>
<Layer Thickness="0.2" Conductivity="1.0" Cp="1000.0" Density="1600.0"/>
<Layer Thickness="0.06" Conductivity="0.3529" Cp="1000.0" Density="1.2" NRE=”41” GWP=”200” UBP=”33”/> 
<Layer Thickness="0.04" Conductivity="1.0" Cp="1000.0" Density="1600.0"/>
<Layer Thickness="0.01" Conductivity="0.58" Cp="900.0" Density="1200.0"/> 
</Composite>

It defines a composite referred by the id number 7 which contains 5 layers and can be used for a Wall. The NRE contains a value for the Non-Renewable Energy $\mathrm{(MJ/kg)}$ content of the material, the GWP a value for the Global Warming Potential $\mathrm{(kg_{CO_2} / kg)}$ of the material, and the UBP $\mathrm{(points/kg)}$ a value for the eco-points.

<Composite id="8" name="Asphalt Road">
<Layer Thickness="0.025" Conductivity="0.75" Cp="920.0" Density="2360.0"/> 
<Layer Thickness="0.02" Conductivity="0.5" Cp="828.0" Density="1300.0"/> 
<Layer Thickness="0.1" Conductivity="0.7" Cp="936.0" Density="1800.0"/> 
<Layer Thickness="0.85" Conductivity="3.4" Cp="936.0" Density="2200.0"/>
</Composite>

It defines a composite referred by the id number 8 which contains 4 layers (asphalt, sand, gravel, molasse) that can be used for a Ground, again with layers mentioned from outside to inside the ground.

Finally, a composite for a Roof or Ground can be simplified by giving only the corresponding U-value. The U-value includes all the parameters of a layer. The following example illustrates this last element:

<Composite id="9" Uvalue=”0.2” name="Minergie">

In the Tag GroundSurface there are as many Tags Ground as necessary to describe the grounds around the buildings. The Ground surfaces should not be covered by buildings, but rather be around the buildings.

<GroundSurface>
<Ground id="55" ShortWaveReflectance="0.2" type="8" kFactor="1" detailedSimulation="true">
<V0 x="15" y="30" z="0.0"/>
<V1 x="15 " y="25 " z="0.0"/>
<V2 x="40 " y="25 " z="0.0"/>
</Ground>
<Ground id="56" ShortWaveReflectance="0.3" type="8" kFactor="0" >
<V0 x="15 " y="30 " z="0.0"/>
<V1 x="40 " y="25 " z="0.0"/>
<V2 x="40" y="30 " z="0.0"/>
</Ground>
</GroundSurface>

The GroundSurface tag refers to two triangular Ground surfaces of Composite type number 8 and of respectively a shortwave reflectance 0.2 and 0.3. For bare soil, the kFactor corresponds to 1 (saturated soils), 0.6-0.8 (moist soils), 0.4-0.5 dry soils and 0.1-0.2 (arid soil). For soil covered by grass, the kFactor corresponds to 0.7. The reader can refer to Coccolo (2017) for more information.

For the ground surface id 55, the detailedSimulation attribute is set to true which represents a detailed calculation of the ground surface temperature without lumping the different layers present inside the ground. This consumes more computational time but is more accurate. The simplified lumped model has only one temperature for the whole Composite, while the detailed model has one temperature for each Layer in the Composite.

Note: by default, grounds will be simulated using the simplified model when the detailedSimulation attribute is missing.

In the tag Trees, there are as many Tree tags as necessary. A Tree tag represents a tree or a simplified forest. It contains one Leaf and one or more Trunc tags. A Trunc tag represents a single side of the trunk, and there are usually at least 4 of them.

<Trees>
<Tree class="C3" deciduous="false" id="6000" key="Tree6000" leafAreaIndex="1"
 leafDistance="1" leafWidth="0.1" name="other">
<Leaf LongWaveEmissivity="0.95" ShortWaveReflectance="0.3" id="6001">
</Leaf>
<Trunc LongWaveEmissivity="0.95" ShortWaveReflectance="0.3" id="6002">
</Trunc>
</Tree>
</Trees>

<Tree class="C3" deciduous="false" id="34" key="Tree34" leafAreaIndex="1" 
leafDistance="1" leafWidth="0.1" name="Platane à feuilles d' érable">
<Leaf LongWaveEmissivity="0.95" ShortWaveReflectance="0.3" id="35">
<V0 x="137.53599999845028" y="-561.4200000008568" z="628.5086689316406" />
 <V1 x="136.53599999845028" y="-559.6880000008568" z="628.5086689316406" /> 
<V2 x="134.53599999845028" y="-559.6880000008568" z="628.5086689316406" /> 
<V3 x="133.53599999845028" y="-561.4200000008568" z="628.5086689316406" /> 
<V4 x="134.53599999845028" y="-563.1520000008568" z="628.5086689316406" /> 
<V5 x="136.53599999845028" y="-563.1520000008568" z="628.5086689316406" />
</Leaf>
<Trunc LongWaveEmissivity="0.95" ShortWaveReflectance="0.3" id="36">
<V0 x="2578197.837999998" y="1183026.8199615234" z="621.5086689316406" /> 
<V1 x="2578197.837999998" y="1183026.8199615234" z="628.5086689316406" /> 
<V2 x="2578197.8679999984" y="1183026.7679999992" z="628.5086689316406" />
 <V3 x="2578197.8679999984" y="1183026.7679999992" z="621.5086689316406" />
</Trunc>
(more Trunc tags...)
</Tree>

Specific Tree tag attributes :

• class : represents the type of tree. Currently, only “C3” is supported
• deciduous : whether the tree loses its leaves during winter
• leafWidth : Dimension of the specific leaf, in meters
• leafDistance : Distance between each surface, in meters (default to 1)

Some elements can shade a part of the analysed building and do not need to be simulated. It’s possible such element in the file to simulate only the shadow of the element without other computation as following :

<ShadingSurface>
<Surface id="54" type="10” ShortWaveReflectance="0.2">
<V0 x="56.33630857784846" y="-87.43429282902677" z="0.0"/>
 <V1 x="56.33630857784846" y="2.6159466366386184" z="0.0"/> 
<V2 x="156.28604298012556" y="2.6159466366386184" z="0.0"/>
 <V3 x="156.28604298012556" y="-87.43429282902677" z="0.0"/> 
</Surface>
</ShadingSurface>

Sometimes, ones has to be carefull, if the surface has to generate shadow in two direction, the same element must appear two times. In both, there is the same vertices but in two opposite direction (v0-v1-v2-v3; v3-v2-v1-v0).