Flexi Says: Earth is farther from the Sun during the Northern Hemisphere summer and closer to the Sun in the Northern Hemisphere winter. However, the difference in distance is very slight. The seasons are caused by the tilt of the planet, not by its orbit. If seasons were caused by Earth’s orbit, then both hemispheres would experience winter and summer at the same time. Earth has seasons because its axis of rotation is tilted at 23.5 degrees to the orbital plane. This means different latitudes get different amounts of sunlight at different times of year.
