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Limited application of reflective surfaces can mitigate urban heat island effect. [3] Reflective surfaces can be used to change the albedo of agricultural and urban areas, noting that a 0.04-0.1 albedo change in urban and agricultural areas could potentially reduce global temperatures for overshooting 1.0 °C. [1]
Enceladus, a moon of Saturn, has one of the highest known optical albedos of any body in the Solar System, with an albedo of 0.99. Another notable high-albedo body is Eris, with an albedo of 0.96. [65] Many small objects in the outer Solar System [66] and asteroid belt have low albedos down to about 0.05. [67]
Cloud albedo is a measure of the albedo or reflectivity of a cloud. Clouds regulate the amount of solar radiation absorbed by a planet and its solar surface irradiance . Generally, increased cloud cover correlates to a higher albedo and a lower absorption of solar energy .
Some studies recommended efforts to maximize solar reflectance or albedo of surfaces, with a goal of thermal emittance of 90%. For example, increasing reflectivity from 0.2 (typical rooftop) to 0.9 is far more impactful than improving an already reflective surface, such as from 0.9 to 0.97. [10]
Details of how clouds interact with shortwave and longwave radiation at different atmospheric heights [17]. Clouds have two major effects on the Earth's energy budget: they reflect shortwave radiation from sunlight back to space due to their high albedo, but the water vapor contained inside them also absorbs and re-emits the longwave radiation sent out by the Earth's surface as it is heated by ...
Gloss reflection. Gloss is an optical property which indicates how well a surface reflects light in a specular (mirror-like) direction. It is one of the important parameters that are used to describe the visual appearance of an object.
By careful choice of the type and thickness of the dielectric layers, one can design an optical coating with specified reflectivity at different wavelengths of light. Dielectric mirrors are also used to produce ultra-high reflectivity mirrors: values of 99.999% or better over a narrow range of wavelengths can be produced using special techniques.
Reflectivity is the square of the magnitude of the Fresnel reflection coefficient, [4] which is the ratio of the reflected to incident electric field; [5] as such the reflection coefficient can be expressed as a complex number as determined by the Fresnel equations for a single layer, whereas the reflectance is always a positive real number.