Surface Energy Balance demo

Pick one or two roofing materials and explore how their surface temperature responds to a diurnal cycle. The model is the same 1D conduction + surface energy balance that runs on the desktop demo, executing here in Python via Pyodide.

What you’re seeing

The simulation solves the 1D heat equation through a surface layer with material properties from materials.json, driven by a diurnal forcing of shortwave $K\downarrow$, longwave $L\downarrow$, and air temperature $T_a$. The surface boundary condition closes the energy balance:

where $K^*$ and $L^*$ are net shortwave and longwave radiation, $H$ and $E$ are sensible and latent heat fluxes, and $G$ is the ground heat flux.