Characterization and assessment of potential environmental risk of tailings stored in seven impoundments in the Aries river basin, Western Romania

Table 8 Loadings of the 4 PC’s considering as variables the leached metals and ions concentration

Parameter	PC1	PC2	PC3	PC4
Al	0.864**	−0.017	0.330	0.019
Fe	0.070	−0.143	0.909**	0.065
Ca	0.278	−0.047	0.875**	0.092
K	−0.105	0.873**	−0.193	0.211
Mg	0.903**	−0.109	0.061	0.087
Na	−0.097	0.914**	−0.053	0.078
Mn	0.905**	−0.059	0.181	−0.001
Ba	0.083	0.682*	−0.031	0.513*
Zn	0.874**	−0.095	0.287	−0.015
Pb	0.589*	−0.178	0.685*	0.077
Cu	0.792**	−0.109	0.465	0.032
Ni	0.882**	−0.083	0.267	−0.005
Cr	0.566*	−0.280	0.612*	−0.011
As	0.370	−0.362	0.400	0.413
Cd	0.901**	−0.085	0.188	−0.027
Co	0.900**	−0.064	0.202	−0.004
Sr	0.322	0.277	0.802**	0.153
Ti	0.584*	−0.130	0.696*	0.104
pH	−0.319	0.543*	−0.411	0.516*
EC	0.543*	−0.048	0.745*	0.045
DOC	0.073	0.069	0.398	0.791**
F^-	0.653*	−0.027	0.649*	0.082
Cl^-	−0.008	0.734*	0.459	−0.170
NO₃^-	−0.189	0.852**	−0.120	−0.227
SO₄^2-	0.579*	−0.088	0.715*	0.055
NH₄⁺	0.207	−0.152	0.664*	−0.290
Variability (%)	61	18	11	6

**strong influence on the latent factor (>0.75); *moderate influence on the latent factor (0.50–0.75).

ISSN: 2661-801X