Hey @joshkpeterson
It’s clear you’ve done a bunch of research, and it seems a lot of folks are interested and puzzled by your question too.
I think @dmitry dmitry’s suggestion and conclusion is spot on. As of now, none of the components in Ladybug Tools can efficiently calculate the outdoor air temperature via convection (Butterfly can do some of this, but the complexity of outdoor thermal environments is still too much for Butterfly’s current capabilities).
However, if you’re looking to add surfaces with specific temperatures, I believe there’s a very straightforward way to do that, which will keep the model from getting overly complex.
If you keep your software updated, you’ll find a new component named “HB Other Side Temperature” in HB Energy version 1.5 and onwards. This component lets you alter surface temperature based on the input temperature (in Celsius) or the convection coefficient (in W/m2-K). You can use this to influence the mean radiant temperature around any surface. Also, in the same HB Energy version 1.5, the UTCI Comfort Map component is quite flexible.
I have created a simple surface and grid lattice to capture the computational results, as depicted in the image below.
Next, you can use the workflow illustrated in the diagram below as a control group. Please note that the HB Face defining the temperature needs to be added to the HB Rooms, even if it is ultimately an open HB Room, as this does not affect the expected results.
Finally, when previewing the results, you will clearly notice significant changes in the UTCI calculation based on different surface temperatures. In my case, the surface temperature is quite extreme at 300°C.
This is the UTCI calculated under default conditions.
This is the UTCI calculated under the conditions where the face temperature has been changed.
Clearly, modifying the surface temperature alone has an effect. But whether or not this outcome is meaningful, that’s something you’ll have to figure out on your own. if you get some results, we’d love it if you could share with us!
Best，
Zhengrong