On July 6, the Earth will reach its furthest point from the Sun, and its orbital speed will decrease to the lowest value of the year. Levon Azizyan, director of the "Hydrometeorology and Monitoring Center" SNOC, reports this.
On July 6, the Earth will pass the aphelion point of its orbit, being at the greatest distance from the Sun during the year. On that day, the orbital speed of our planet will reach the minimum value of the year.
Since the Earth's orbit is not perfectly circular, but elliptical, our planet approaches the Sun at approximately the same time each year once (in January at perihelion) and at its furthest away from it (July at aphelion). On July 6, 2026, Earth will be 152,093,251 km (or 1.0167 AU) from the Sun.
On that day, Earth's orbital speed will decrease to 29.27–29.29 km/s, while at perihelion it increases to 30.27–30.29 km/s. In addition, on July 6, the visible angular diameter of the Sun will also be the smallest during the year.
This change is caused by Kepler's second law, according to which the planets move faster when they are closer to the Sun, and slower when they are farther away from it.
