Convective dissolution of CO2 in saline aquifers: Progress in modeling and experiments

The dissolution of carbon dioxide (CO2) in deep saline aquifer water is recognized as one of the fundamental mechanisms in the subsurface for storing significant quantities of CO2. One fundamental physical effect of CO2 dissolution is the slight increase in water density in the layer in contact with the buoyant free-phase CO2 plume. Under specific conditions, this may lead to gravitational instability and the onset of free convection,...