Question

The lowest temperature of a day generally occurs early in the_

Answer 1

the lowest temperature usually occurs a little after sunrise,sometimes as much as a half hour to an hour later.

The reason for this is that the earth's surface continually emits longwave infrared radiation. During the day, it also receives incoming shortwave radiation from the sun. At night, outgoing energy exceeds incoming, causing temperatures to fall. This process typically continues until the sun rises and climbs high enough for incoming radiation to become stronger than the outgoing, so that temperatures begin to climb again. In addition, there can be an effect on calm, clear mornings where a very shallow layer of especially cold air near the ground is mixed to a few feet higher when the sun first begins to warm the surface, causing temperatures a few feet off the ground to take an added dip at that time.