Does color affect reflection of heat?
Objects appear different colors because they absorb or reflect different amounts and wavelengths of light. A black object absorbs nearly all the light that hits it while a white object absorbs almost none. A red object absorbs the blue and green wavelengths while not absorbing the red wavelengths. So what happens to that light that gets absorbed? Usually, it is turned into heat and the object warms up. So if you were to put identical objects out in the sun with one painted black and the other white, the black one would absorb a lot of light and heat up much more. So you could say the black object is absorbing more heat from the sun. It’s really absorbing more light and converting it into heat. That’s only part of the story, there is a lot of infrared energy out there and that is absorbed or reflected too. The properties of the object in absorbing infrared will influence how much it heats up. However, the properties in the infrared are not directly related to color.
