Tuesday, 6 July 2021

Aphelion

The Earth tilts on its axis, as it rotates around the sun, influencing the seasons. The Earth's orbit is also mildly elliptical, rather than being a perfect circle. The orbit's elliptical nature is due to the gravitational pulls of the other planets in the solar system. Their pull will change with planetary allignments. Aphelion is the name given to the point when the Earth is furthest from its sun (https://www.theguardian.com/science/2021/jul/05/starwatch-weve-got-aphelion-the-suns-further-away). This year, Aphelion was reached near midnight (GMT) on July 5th. Today, the Earth is some 5m kilometres more distant from the sun than it was in early January. Consequently, the record high temperatures seen in Canada, USA and the Nordic countries (described in other posts), have all occurred at a time when one might expect solar gain to be reduced. Seems a bit worrying?
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