Color temperature, more precisely correlated color temperature is used to describe “white” in a television display system. It describes how someone with normal color vision, a “standard observer” would match white as seen on a display with a notional black body radiator perhaps a piece of metal, heated to a temperature given in degrees Kelvin. The chosen “white” color used by most television systems is Illuminant D65 defined by the CIE, this would be visual match to a black body radiator heated to 6504 degrees Kelvin.
See also: White Point, CIE