Water Resources Research - 1997 - Wooding - Convection in Groundwater Below An Evaporating Salt Lake 1 Onset of

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WATER RESOURCES RESEARCH, VOL. 33, NO. 6, PAGES 1199-1217, JUNE 1997
Convection in groundwater below an evaporating salt lake:

1. Onset of instability
R. A. Wooding
CSIRO Centre for Environmental Mechanics, Canberra, Australia
Scott W. Tyler
Water ResourcesCenter, Desert Research Institute, Reno, Nevada
Ian White
Water Research Foundation of Australia, Centre for Resource and Environmental Studies, The Australian
National University,Canberra,Australia
Abstract. Convectivegroundwatermotion can be generatedin aquifersbeneathand

adjacentto salinelakes. Suchmotionsstronglycontrol the subsurfacedistributionof salts,
the formation of salineminerals,and the distributionof contaminantsthat may be
disposedof in the salinelake. In particular, schemesto use salinelakes as evaporation
basinsfor irrigationwastewatersmust considerthe groundwaterdynamicsassociatedwith
convection.The convectionis driven by the evaporativeconcentrationof saltsat the land
surface,leadingto an unstabledistributionof density.However,the evaporative
groundwaterdischargecan dynamicallystabilizethis salineboundarylayer and inhibit
convection.In this work we investigatethe nature and onsetof convectionfor a range of
boundaryconditionstypicallyfound in salinelakes.Processes involvedin the accumulation
of salt at the surfaceof a groundwaterdischargezone and in the gravitationalinstability
of the near-surfacegroundwaterare considered.Resultsof theoreticalstabilityanalysisare
appliedthroughlaboratoryand numericalexperimentationto the more complex
geometriestypicallyfound in the field. Thesecomparisons indicatethat for large saline
lakes,the stabilityof the salineboundarylayer can be parameterizedby traditional
Rayleighcriteria, in which the aquifer permeabilityand the evaporationrate from the lake
bed are principalcontrollingfactors.For typicalsalinelake environments,convectionwill
dominate
in sediments
whosepermeability
exceeds
approximately
10-14m2.Belowthis
thresholdpermeability,the boundarylayer shouldbe stabilizedby the evaporativeflux,
resultingin the accumulationof saltsand evaporitesat the land surface.These results
provideinsightinto the predictivebehaviorof groundwaterdynamicsand solute
distributionsin many natural systems.
Introduction regions along the Murray and Darling Rivers. Rising saline
groundwatersare a major threat to theseirrigation areas,and
Saline lakes, or salinas,occur in arid and semiarid environ- the onlycurrentviablemeansof salinitycontrolis to pump out
ments throughout the world. They represent terminal dis- and removethe groundwater.Salinelakesappearto be attrac-
chargezoneswhere evaporationof groundwaterand surface tive candidates as evaporation basins for pumped saline
water has resulted in the accumulation of salts at the land
groundwater and other wastewaters,and some have already
surface.The dynamicalprocessescontrollingthe subsurface been established.Their use as evaporationbasinsand disposal
distributionof saltsand their subsequenteffectson the down- sites,however,raisessignificantquestionsconcerningimpacts
ward convectionhavereceivedrelativelylittle attention.These on the groundwaterdynamicsof salinasand on the region.For
processesare central to our understandingthe role of ground- example, the question of the hydrodynamicstability of the
water convection beneath saline lakes, the formation of near-surface brines must be addressed in order to understand
evaporites,and the effectsof climate on groundwaterdynam- the long-termfate of thesebrines.
ics. Saline lakes have also been considered sites for brine dis-
posal and other wastesbecausethey apparentlyrepresentthe This Study
terminusof groundwaterflow. This may not be the case,how-
ever, if significantconvectionis occurringin the subsurface In thiswork we examinethe processes involvedin the accu-
owingto density-drivenflow. mulationof salt near the land surfaceof a salinelake or playa,
Salinelakesin Australiahavebeen considereddisposalsites includingthe gravitationalinstabilityof near-surfaceground-
for saline ground and drainage waters beneath agricultural water and its subsequentdownward convection.The overall
objectivesare to model the groundwaterdynamicsof evapo-
Copyright1997 by the American GeophysicalUnion. ratingsaltlakes,to identifyappropriatelengthscales and time-
Paper number96WR03533. scalesof the processesinvolved,to comparemodelpredictions
0043-1397/97/96WR-03533509.00 with laboratoryexperiments,and, finally, to identify parame-
1199
19447973, 1997, 6, Downloaded from https://agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1029/96WR03533 by Cas - Shanghaitech University, Wiley Online Library on [27/10/2022]. See the Terms and Conditions (https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/terms-and-conditions) on Wiley Online Library for rules of use; OA articles are governed by the applicable Creative Commons License
1200 WOODING ET AL.: CONVECTION IN GROUNDWATER, 1
ters that may be used to assessthe suitabilityof salt lakes for oration rather than topography may become the dominant
wastewaterdisposal. control on brine recirculation.In such regions,evaporation
Here we focus attention on the behavior of the saline bound- from the playasurfaceinducesa verticalcomponentof ground-
ary layer that will developat or near the land surfaceasa result water flow upward through the entire lake bed surface to
of evaporation.The stabilityof the layer is investigatedusing supplythe evaporativedemand. This upflowinggroundwater
linear stabilityanalysisand extendedto a realisticsalinelake then may provide a stabilizingforce and inhibit brine recircu-
geometrythrough analogueand numericalmodelingstudies. lation in suchsystems.The resultingdistributionof saltsand
These resultsare usedto determinethe environmentalparam- groundwaterconvectionmay be dramatically different from
eters that control the nature of convection. that shownby Duffy and Al-Hassan [1988] and could result in
In part 2 [Woodinget al., this issue]the evolutionof brine evaporitedeposition.
plumes and long-term convectivebehavior are investigated Someevidenceof evaporation-drivengroundwaterflow may
both numericallyand experimentallyto developa quantitative be deduced from the observed distribution of brines. In the
understandingof the temporalbehavior(on a geologictime- case of Lake Frome, in central Australia, Allison and Barnes
scale) of brine recirculationin saline lake groundwatersys- [1985]showedthat the concentrations of certainisotopes,and
tems. also the salinity,decreasewith depth over a distanceof less
than 1 m belowthe surfaceof the lake bed; they attributedthis
Previous Studies on Saline Lake Convection
profile to upwardflow of groundwaterdrivenby surfaceevap-
Saline lakes and their associatedgroundwaterflow have oration.However,for the samelake Bowler[1986]showedthat
received considerableattention over the years. These lakes a zone of brine ("brine pool") extendsto about 60 m depth.
have generallybeen consideredterminal dischargeregionsfor The sourceof thisbrine at that depthmaybe related to chang-
both groundwaterand salts dissolvedin groundwater.How- ing climatic conditionsor could be the result of convectionof
ever, the continuousevaporationof groundwaterleads to an near-surface brines.Jacobson et al. [1993]foundthat at Scotia
increasein salinity (and therefore density) of groundwater Lakes, a small groundwaterdischargecomplexin the western
near the land surface.The resultinginverted densitydistribu- Murray Basin of Australia, a gravitationallyunstabledistribu-
tion (densebrines at the surfacewith freshet groundwater tion of brines exists in the upper 1 m of lacustrine clays.
below) may be unstable,and the possibilityof convectionex- Underlyingthe claysare interbeddedsandsand claysin which
ists.Allisonand Barnes[1985]discussed the significance
of the the salinitygradient reverses,which is perhapsindicativeof
accumulatedsalt budgetsobservedfor various lakes and sug- somegroundwateroverturningdue to the movementof evap-
gestedthat the amountof salt presentappearedto be consid- oration-concentrated brines.In contrastto ScotiaLake, nearby
erably less than would be expectedif these lakes were the Nulla Lake exhibits a nearly linear decreasein pore water
terminalsof drainagesystems.It wasproposedthat slowdown- salinitywith depth, suggesting a purely diffusionaltransportof
ward convectionof densesalinewater (brine) beneaththe lake salts back to the underlying groundwater [Jacobsonet al.,
bedscouldpartially accountfor low salt budgets[Telleret al., 1993].While the environmentalconditionsat thesetwo lakes
1982]. Smith et al. [1987] and Friedman et al. [1997] have are similar, the sediments at Nulla Lake consist of lacustrine
suggestedthat the downwardmigration of near-surfacebrines claysto a much greater depth, suggestingthat sedimentper-
may be responsiblefor isotopicanomaliesin both Searlesand meabilitymay play a critical role in controllinggroundwater
OwensLakes in easternCalifornia. Woodand Sanford[1990] convection.
showed clearly that the steady state distribution of salts in
salinelake aquifersis stronglyaffectedby not only the initial
solutespresentbut also the dynamicsof the groundwatercir- Conceptual Model of Groundwater Flow Beneath
culation. Salt Lakes
DuffyandAl-Hassan[1988] describedthe systemof ground- Figure 1 showsan idealized crosssectionof a "dry" saline
water flow in Pilot Valley, Utah: a basinwith steepmountains lake in which evaporationfrom the groundwaterdominates.
that is ................
nym mug•cany c•u•cd. The gravity-driveninflow from Groundwaterdischarges throughthe lake marginsand the lake
precipitationis balancedon averageby evaporationlossfrom bed primarily as evaporation.The groundwaterflow direction
a playa-lakesystemand its marginalareas.The authorsuseda is towardsthe lake, but this small-scaleflow systemmay be
two-dimensionalnumerical model of the groundwatersystem imbeddedin a regionalflow system.Obviously,conditionsat
to obtainsteadystateflow solutions,one feature of thesebeing the lake surfaceare not steadyat short timescalesbecauseof
a saline groundwatermound lying beneath the lake, the hori- the diurnal variation of surface temperature and wind and
zontal extent of which depended upon a Rayleigh number seasonal inflows to the lake from rainfall and surface runoff.
basedupon the scaleof permeablesedimentdepth. However,we are interestedin examiningthe stabilityof con-
While DuffyandAl-Hassan[1988]clearlyshowedthat brine centratedbrinesbuilt up by somenatural "averaging"of these
recirculation may exist for some saline-lake systems,their processes.We assumehere that the dominant timescaleis
boundaryconditionswithin the playa may not be representa- considerablylonger than diurnal or seasonaltimescales,al-
tive of all saline-lakesystems.These authorsassumedthat the thoughthis may not be appropriatein a nonlinearsystem.
groundwater flux through the playa surface was controlled In this work we shall assume that the lake sediments beneath
primarily by topographywith most of the ground-waterdis- the salt crust are saturated.The lake surface itself may be
chargebeingconstrainedto the marginsof the lake bed. Under either a "dry" salt crustor pondedwater due to surfaceinflows
suchconditions,their modeling resultsindicatedthat convec- or impoundment of wastewater.For each case, evaporation
tion of densebrinesfrom the central portionsof the lake bed can lead to the developmentof a densebrine that may or may
would alwaysoccur. not be stable. In the stable case, salts remain near the lake
In regionswhere topographymay play a lessimportantrole, surface. For the unstable case the salts are convected back into
suchas in central Australia or the High Plainsof Texas,evap- the underlyinggroundwater.The consequences
of these two
WOODING ET AL.' CONVECTION IN GROUNDWATER, 1 1201
Margin/i
I
Accumulation I _-.
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..............................
Figure 1. Crosssectionof a saltlakemargin,showing

part of the evaporation
layer(groundwater
discharge
zone)overlyinga permeableaquifer.Rechargeis assumedto takeplacefrom the right.
outcomesare dramaticallydifferent and define the environ- Op

mentalconsequences of wastewaterevaporationand disposal 0 •- + q' Vp= OV'(D-Vp) (4)
aswell asprovidingcontrolson the distributionof evaporites.
using(1) with q definedfrom (2). Here D is the dispersivity
Governing Equations of Motion tensor.(SeealsoworkbyHerbertet al. [1988]andvanDuijn et
Quantificationof salt buildup beneath an evaporatingsalt al. [1993].)
lake leadsimmediatelyto coupledequationsfor water and salt
transport.Theseequationsare stronglycoupledbecauseof the Dimensionless Form of the Equations
dominanceof the densityof the fluid.Solutionof the equations Followingusualprocedures,we now write the aboveequa-
requiresboth simplifications
andconstitutive relationsthat are tions in dimensionlessform. We normalize p with respectto
presentedin thissection.In orderto examinethe behaviorof the maximumchangein densityrelevantto gravitationalcon-
the convective brine, we make use of a linearized form of vection,A p = Pm -- Pr' /Sdso,the densitycontributiondue to
Darcy'slaw for fluid flow in porousmaterials,togetherwith the background(ambient)salinity,Pr - Po >- 0, appearsin evap-
conservation equationsfor fluid and salt. orationboundaryconditionsthat involvetotal mobile solute.
The equationsare formulatedin termsof densityto main- Here Po --<Pr,• P • Pm' Let
tain the linearityof Darcy'slaw. By continuityof mass,for the
fluid,
S= Ap (Sa)
---+ V.u: o (])
Pr Ot
Pr- PO (5b)
where (b is porosity,assumedto be locallyconstant,and t is
time. In (1),
Ap
P y= (Sc)
Pr
u: --q (2)
Pr
with 0 -< S -< 1, while Sr (>--O) is the rescaleddensitychange
is a vector proportionalto the massflow rate, q being the due to backgroundsalinity.
Darcy volumeflow rate, while Pr is the densitywhen a back- The quantities•, and D can be renderednon-dimensional
ground(ambient) salinityis present. usingthebackground kinematicviscosity, •'r, andan appropri-
Darcy'slaw gives ate scalardiffusivity,D M, the moleculardiffusivityof salt in
1 p v solutionmodifiedby tortuosity.The changesto dimensionless
- - + . = 0 (3) •, and D will be assumedto have been made without changeof
Prvp gPr • notation. We take H to be a physicallyrelated length mac-
in whichthe permeabilityk is assumedto be locallyconstant. roscale,typicallythe verticalthickness of the aquifer.Thiswill
While the kinematicviscosity•, =tdp of saturatedsaltsolution be usedto render the spatialoperator,V, dimensionless with-
is about 1.65 times that of water, the dependenceof •, upon out changeof notation.We definethe scalefor the convective
For theoret- mass flow rate to be
densitygenerallydoesnot alterresultssignificantly.
ical studies,either •, or O•,/Op
often can be treated as constant.
The massconservationequationfor solutetransportcanbe 'ygko
Uc= -- (6)
taken in the form ]Jr
with k o beingthe Darcy permeabilityof the aquifer.From (6)

the dimensionless mass-relatedvelocitycan be definedas U =
U/Uc, and the dimensionlesstime can be defined as T =
OS +1 [O(S,
or 0(¾,•bl)
+ O(S,
o(z,•2)
+ O(S,
o(x,•3)]
r)
Uct/H. The Rayleighnumber is 1
= R-•V-(D. VS) (14)
ucH
Rs= DM (7a) using standardnotation for the three Jacobianson the left-
hand side.The secondof thesedropsout when viscouseffects
ygkoH are neglected;the equationthen corresponds to that givenby
Rs--1,,rDm (7b) Home [1979]for the caseof gravitationalthermalconvectionin
a porousmedium.
H
Our governingequationsare now (13) and (14) with
Rs= lM (7c) solenoidal. Many convection problemshavebeensimplifiedby
the well-knownmethodof replacingfluid parametersby con-
wherel;u = D;u/Ucis an intrinsicdiffusive/convective length
stant values, except when they affect buoyancy.This is the
scale:the diffusionlength. When isotropicdispersionis as-
Boussinesq approximation. Thus in (13) and (14) it is appro-
sumed,we maytake a more generalizedD (-> D;u) and define
priate to neglectquantitieswith the coefi%ient3/. It is then
a more "physicallyrelevant" length scale,l = D/uc.
logicallycorrectto take •, --- •'r = constant,whichis justifiable
In this and followingsectionsa dimensionlessCartesianco-
if variableviscositydoesnot inducequalitative changes.
ordinatesystem(X, Y, Z) will be used,with Y directedver-
For the classof problemsconsideredin this work we may
tically upwards,correspondingto a systemof orthogonalunit also reduce the number of dimensions. The reduction of the
vectors(i, j, k). In dimensionless form, (1)-(4) become
abovethree-dimensionalanalysisto two dimensionsis partic-
OS ularly straightforward.Droppingthe dependenceon the hori-
+ v. u = 0 (8) zontal Z coordinatereducesthe vector potential to the com-
ponent ½3 -- ½, a scalarstreamfunction.Equation (13) is
VP + jS + M-1U = 0 (9) reducedto a singlePoissonequationwith a two-dimensional
versionof the operatorV, and in (14) a singleJacobianex-
OS 1 1
pressionis retained. Two- and three-dimensionalconvection
O•+ 4•(1 + •/S)U.VS= •ssV.(D.VS) (10) under gravityare similar,particularlywhen the effectsof vari-
able viscosityare small. This considerationis used in the
In (9),M = (k/•')/(ko/•'r)isthedimenSionless fluidmobility
presentwork to justify the choiceof two-dimensionalnumer-
and P is a dimensionlesshydraulic head with P - Y/•/ =
ical and experimentalsimulationsof a three-dimensionalsalt
p/(gApH).
lake margin.
There are two approaches that reduce(8), (9), and (10) to
more tractableforms [Home, 1979].The pressureformulation Boundary Conditions
involvesthe elimination of U to give scalardifferentialequa-
tions for P and S. However, Horne has shownthat the vector The boundary conditionspresent at the surface of many
potentialformulationusedbyHolstandAziz [1972]is superior saline lakes vary widely, from ponded surfacewater to a dry
for numericalcomputation.Substituting salt crustwhere vapor transportmay dominate.We simplify
the situationby describingonly the end members:a ponded
U = -V• + curl • (11) surfaceor a dry salt crust.A distributedupflowthroughthe
lake bed is assumedto existin both cases.This is drivenby
into (8) when • is the solenoidalvecto•potentialfield and ß groundwater headin both,Withan addedcontribution dueto
is the scalarfield givesa scalarPoissonequation:
evaporationpotential deficit in the secondcase.Evaporation
OS from the dry saltlake surfacemaybe significantly lessthan for
v'a>= 0r the ponded case. However, most dry salt lake surfaceshave
water saturatedsedimentsjust below the salt crust.
The contribution from cI) takes into account effects of fluid The pondedconditioncorresponds to a constantpressureat
dilation and usuallymay be disregardedfor small % The solu- a horizontalboundarygiving,from Darcy'slaw (9), two con-
tion of (i2) is thencp_=0, whichcorresponds
to V ßU = 0. ditions at the surface, that is,
Takingthe curl of Darcy'sLaw (9) gives
0--•= 0 (15a)
V2•=M k•-•-i• aS aS)
+M-I[(VM.V)•
+ (•. V)VM- V(•. VM)] (•3) --oY = 0 (15b)
since V ß• = 0. The last two terms in the coefficient of M- • at Y = Ys = constant,the surfacevalue,so that the stream-
vanishin two dimensions. Equation(13) representsthree sca- lines are normal to the boundary.Thus the singleDirichlet
lar Poissonequationsfor the components of the vectorpoten- conditionon pressureis replacedby two Neumann conditions
tial •. If the mobility,M, is a constant,onlythe gravitational oncomponents
ofthevector
potential.
Forthesituation
shown
terms are nonzero on the right-handside, and (13) corre- in Figure 1 we assumethat the water table upgradientfrom the
spondsto the equationfor three-dimensional convectiondis- saline lake can be treated as an impermeable horizontal
cussedby Home [1979]. boundary,terminating at the margin of the lake. Then the
With the samesubstitution
of (11), (10) becomes constantpressureboundaryconditionthat appliesover the
WOODING ET AL.: CONVECTION IN GROUNDWATER, 1 1203
lake surfaceleads to a nonuniformupward flux through the computationalsolutionmethodsfor the discretizedequations

surface;a mathematicalsingularityexistsat the marginand the in two andthreedimensions [Homeand O'Sullivan,1974,1978;
upwardflux is unboundedthere. In nature this corresponds to Green and Foster, 1975; Home, 1979]. These authors mainly
a zone of finite width near the lake margin where springsare used direct reduction methods to solve the scalar Poisson
often found. equation(s)arisingfrom (13) and discretizedthe Jacobjan(s),
For a "dry" salt lake the evaporationrate e will be assumed of the form O(S, ½)/O(X, Y), in the two- and three-
to be a known function of position and time. In this casethe dimensionalversionsof (14) by the methodofArakawa [1966].
streamlinesare not constrainedto be perpendicular to the Arakawa's difference method is best known in the form of the
boundary,and e is the vertical componentof the groundwater second-ordernine-point "box" template,which was shownby
flow rate acrossthe surface.The nonzero componentsof the Jesperson[1974] to be a finite element method. Home and
vector potential along Y = Ys satisfy O'Sullivan[1974, 1978] also used the fourth-orderArakawa
13-point template derived by superpositionof two appropri-
042 043
ately chosen9-point templates.Note that Arakawa's method
j.curl•= OZ OX= e/uc= E (16) can be extendedby usinggeneralizedversionsof the discrete
where E is the dimensionless evaporationrate. Sincethere is Jacobian[Salmonand Talley,1989].
an inflow to the evaporatingsurfacethe result is a net hori- In this paper and in part 2 [Woodinget al., this issue]we
zontalflux of groundwaterfrom the marginstowardsthe more describethe results obtained by simulatingtwo-dimensional
centralareasof the lake. For a two-dimensional flow, (16) can convectionin a porous medium numericallyfor comparison
be integrated alongthehorizontal lakebedsurface to provide with several experimental series using Hele-Shaw cells. Our
a Dirichlet condition on 4. numerical solution employed a finite differenceformulation
In natural systems,a uniform evaporationrate is likely to with square elementsto maintain near-isotropyof numerical
occuronly when the surfaceof the lake is dry and the water properties.For the direct solutionof the Poissonequationwe
table is somedistancebelow the lake bed. The upwardflux of followedLesieuret al. [1988], using code developedat the
water and soluteswill then be governedby atmosphericand National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR) and
soil properties.While under natural conditionsthe evapora- based upon the Buneman method [Swarztrauberand Sweet,
tion rate is likely to vary somewhatacrossthe lake bed, we take 1979;Adams et al., 1988]. The advectivecomponentof the
this variation to be small. masstransportequationwas discretizedusingthe fourth-order
In additionto the momentumboundaryconditionsdiscussed 13-pointArakawa template. Appropriate time stepswere de-
above,the solutetransportequation(14) requiresconstraints termined empiricallyfor the uniform meshesused.
on the range of concentrationpossibleand conditionson the The Boussinesqapproximationwas assumedto hold in the
flux of solute acrossY - Ys. An overall conditionplaced on main but was relaxed in one respectby retaining the disper-
the solute in the present work is that the concentrationsof sivitytensor as an option in the transport equation. Since the
solutescannot exceed their solubilitylimits. In the case of experimentsused a Hele-Shaw cell, the dispersivitytensor D
pondedsurfacewater discussed in relation to (15), the lake wasreducedto two-dimensionalform, the longitudinalprinci-
surfaceis permeableto both water and solutes,and the simple pal componentcalculatedby Taylor's method as [Wooding,
boundarycondition 1960a;Home and Rodriguez,1983]
s = Sl
maybe assumed.If the overlyingwater is more salinethan the
DL=D•4 2 Pe)2
1+ 1•-•(7 I Pe=D•4 (20)
while the transverseprincipal component(Dr) was assumed
groundwaterin the systembeing considered(p• > p), then
equalto the moleculardispersioncoefficientD•. Here Pe is
Pm = /91 and S = 1 at Y = Ys-
the Pdcletnumberbasedon the spacingb betweenthe plates
For evaporationof groundwaterbrinefrom a "dry"lake bed,
of the cell and (u) is the local mean velocityparallel to the
solid phase precipitation of salts occurs after saturation is
plates.(Horne and Rodriguezuse b to denotethe half spac-
reached.Prior to salt saturationthe boundaryis assumedto be
ing.) In their treatmentof two-dimensional viscousdisplace-
impermeableto solutes,upwardadvectivetransportbalancing
ment,Zimmermanand Homsy[1991]havedescribeda numer-
downwarddiffusion,and the condition at the boundary is
ical model that includesTaylor dispersionin a Hele-Shaw cell,
1 OS and more recently,Zimmermanand Homsy [1992] have gen-
E(Sq-Sr) Rsor = o (18) eralized their model to take into account several other forms of
two-dimensional dispersion. The expansion for the term
where Sr is definedin (5b) and E followsfrom (16). After Rs- •V ß( D. VS) in thisworkwassimilarto thatdescribed
by
saturation(18) is replacedby Zimmerman and Homsy [1991]. In our numericalwork the
dispersionterm was discretizedusing a nine-point box tem-
S= 1 (19)
plate.
taking Pm in (5) equal to the saturationdensity.The precipi- For salt lake simulationit is usuallynecessaryto model both
tated salt is assumedto crossthe boundaryand its subsequent detailed convective flow and larger-scale regional flows in
effecton transportcan be ignored. which the lake is imbedded.We found that numericalstability
appearedto be improvedsubstantiallyby precalculatingeither
the regional flow or an acceptableapproximationof it. Then
Numerical Models
convectiveflowswere calculatedwith appropriatelymodified
The problemof modelinghighlyunstablenonlinearconvec- boundaryconditionsand superimposedupon the large-scale
tive flows using equationsof the form of (13) and (14) has flow, utilizing the linearity of the Poissonequation [Roache,
receivedconsiderableattention,with the developmentof fast 1982].
1204 WOODING ET AL.' CONVECTION IN GROUNDWATER, I
1 ooo
Development of the Boundary Layer
In the presenceof an upfiowwith evaporationat the surface, lOO
the aboveboundaryconditionslead naturallyto the formation
of a soluteboundarylayer below the surfaceof the lake bed. lO
Althoughthe flow rate maybe small,a significantlysalinelayer
can accumulate. Also, since the flow can have a horizontal
componentdue to the inflow of groundwater,the boundary
layerwill beginnear the lake margin.If the boundarylayeris 0.1
stableand the upflowrate • is dominant,an equilibriumcon-
dition canbe reachedwherethe boundarylayerhasa thickness 0.01
scale • given by
0.001
D
S= (21a)
0.0001
o.ool O.Ol o.1 1 lO lOO
This scalingis physicallyvalid for large valuesof the macro- Sr
scopicRayleighnumber,Rs, when the dynamicsof convection
in the boundary layer are independentof the macroscaleH. Figure 2. Dimensionlesstime r s to salt saturationat land
This independencehas been demonstratedboth theoretically surfacesversusbackgroundsalinity parameter Sr defined in
and experimentallyfor the analogouscaseof evaporationat (A16), of AppendixC, for the caseof a dry saltlake.
the surfaceof a layer of fluid with infinite Prandtl number
[Foster,1965a,b, 1969]and hasbeen appliedto convectionin
a vertical Hele-Shaw cell by Greenand Foster[1975]. ambientsalt concentrations.
From (A5a) the actual time to
With the length scale • we can define a corresponding saturation
ists = D*s/S2. As an example,
if Sr = 2/3 (P•/Po
boundarylayer Rayleigh number • 1.1, an appropriate groundwatervalue in some typical
Australianhigh-salinityregions),then rs • 0.82. If we take
Uc•i
R•= D (2lb) D • 10-9 m2/s,an evaporation rates • 0.1 m/d (similarto
that usedin our analogstudies),then the time neededto reach
UC
salt saturation at the surface is 10 min while, for a more
R• = (21c) realisticevaporationrate of e • 0.1 m/yr [Allisonand Barnes,
1985], ts • 2.5 years. The rapidity of salt buildup is partly
explainedby the fact that it is advection-driven.
R•= •- (21d) To illustratethe developmentof the dimensionless salinity/
densityprofile S(y, ,) and its gradientOS/Oy,we choosea
As definedearlierin connectionwith (7), l = D/uc is taken as case relevant to the experimental and numerical study de-
the diffusionlength. The scalarD will be regardedas an iso- scribedlater in thispaper,involvingboundaryconditionsof the
tropic dispersioncoefficient,exceedingD M when hydrody- form of (18) and (19), the caseof the "dry"lakebed.We take
namic dispersionis present.R • can be definedindependently S• = 4 in (A16), for whichsaturationS = 1 is reachedat y =
of D by (21c). 0 at time r s • 0.04107. Having assumedthat the boundary
layeris stable,the solutionfor S versusyfrom (A14) and(A19)
Transient Behavior of the Stable Boundary Layer is given in Figure 3a, taking r in the range 0 to 0.09, with
We consideran initial-valueprobleminvolvinga "switched- interval0.01. For this quite largevalue of S•, indicatinga high
on" flux. Initially, the groundwatersalinityis assumedto be backgroundsalinity,Figure 3a showsa rapid buildup to satu-
uniform, and the surfaceboundary condition correspondsto ration, after which the boundarylayer thicknessgrowsmono-
either the pondedcondition(17) or the "dry" lake condition tonicallytowardsthe steadystate profile S(y, •) = e -y.
(18) followed by (19) as introduced above. The time- Figure 3b givesthe correspondingresultsfor the salinitygra-
dependent(growing)salineboundarylayer startsfrom zero dient givenby (A20) and (A21). The gradientof S increases
and shouldtend towardsthe equilibrium state at large time, rapidlyin magnitudeto a maximumvalue of about -5 at r =
providedthat it is stable.This is an idealizedsimulationof a r s and subsequently declines.
possiblefield situation.An approximatemathematicalderiva-
tion of the time-dependentprofile, given in Appendix C, is Dynamic Stability of the Boundary Layer
obtainedby assuminga steadyuniform vertical upflow in the Thus far we have describedthe developmentof a stablesalt
neighborhoodof the boundary.Although the upflow is not boundarylayer at the lake surfacethat is fed and supportedby
strictlyverticalin the caseof a constant-evaporation
condition upflowinggroundwater.It is clear that this concentrationin-
where only the vertical componentof the boundaryflow is version for the dry salt lake surface, or for the case of an
fixed, numerical studiesshowthat a constant-thicknessbound- overlyingpond that is more salinethan the groundwater,may
ary layer is obtained,and the vertical componentmay be as- be hydrodynamically unstable.Our problem has severalcom-
sumedto predominate.The appropriatescalingfor boundary plications.First, in a stablesituationthe boundarylayer is
layercoordinates is introducedat equations(A5a) and (A5b), assumedto grow slowlytowardsa final equilibriumstate.Sec-
in Appendix C. ond, it containsthe edge of the saline lake as an additional
Equation(A16), in AppendixC, canbe usedto calculatethe boundaryfeature. The transition from the lake surfacewith
time r s neededto reachsalt saturationat the surface.Values uniformevaporation,throughthe lake marginwhere evapora-
of rs are plotted versusSr in Figure 2 for a wide range of tion is assumedto be negligible,involvesa changein salinityof
or to the diffusionlength scale I. We write a and a as the

0 0.2 0.4 0.6 0.8 1.0 respectivedimensionlessforms of the wavenumber,
2•r&
a= X (22a)
0.5
2 •rl a
= = (22b)
Y a X Ra
1.0
where X is the wavelengthof the initial instability.The magni-
/ Steady tudesof & and I dependupon D, which couldbe affectedby
hydrodynamicdispersion.
1.5 a I state
I i i Stability of a Developed Boundary Layer
Existingstabilityanalysesfor the equilibriumboundarylayer
-5 -4 -3 -2 -1 0 provide very useful insights. The basic situation is one-
dimensional since the undisturbed flow is uniform, the concen-
o
tration gradientis exponential,and both are parallel to gravity.
Wooding[1960b] assumeda constantpressureand density
along the horizontalboundarythat allowedboth the upflow
0.5- and disturbancefluxesto passthroughthe boundaryand used
linear stabilityanalysisto showthat the critical value of R a is
6.95 at wavenumbera = 0.4285, usingdefinition(22a), and
1.0 - giving a = 0.06165 from (22b). At higher valuesof Ra, the
Steady boundarylayer is definitelyunstableand convectivemixingor
state
"fingering"may develop.
b
Homsyand Sherwood[1976] analyzeda similarproblemfor
i i i
boundaryconditionsof constantupflow and constantdensity
Figure 3. Profilesof (a) dimensionless salinityparameterS but assumedthat the boundarywas impermeableto distur-
and (b) the dimensionless salt gradientOS/Oyversusdimen- banceswhile permittinga uniform throughflow.They obtained
sionlessboundary layer depth y for a "dry" lake bed in a a critical Rayleighnumber (which they termed "D'Arcy [sic]
uniform steady upflow, with parameter Sr = 4, typical of BuoyancyNumber") of 14.3 at wavenumbera = 0.759 (a =
experiments;at dimensionless timesr (time intervalon curves
0.0531) using linear perturbation theory, and they also
is 0.01); and at steadystate.
showedthat the layer may exhibit subcriticalinstabilityto dis-
turbancesof finite amplitude. In this case a lower bound to
instabilityfound by the energymethod isR a = 5.77. This is an
asymptoticresultfor largeRs. Then for R a > 14.3 the system
finite magnitude.Superficially,the flow close to the margin is definitelyunstable,while for R a < 5.7 7 it is definitelystable.
would appearto be inherentlyunstable.Third, there is a finite The different boundary conditionsproposed by Wooding
upflowthroughthe boundarylayer.As discussed byHomsyand [1960b]and Homsyand Sherwood[1976] (which nevertheless
Sherwood[1976],the stabilityproblemis then not self-adjoint. lead to fairly similar a values) appear to bracket the actual
In principle, the problem can be treated theoreticallyby the conditionsfound in many salt lakes.The conditiondeveloped
energy method. Although we have limited ourselvesin this by Woocling,whichalsoappliedto the model studiedby Green
paper to experimentaland numerical model studiesof this and Foster[1975], is applicablewhere the salt lake has water
aspect,it shouldbe noted that the energymethod applied to pondedon the surface,evenif the pondingis onlyvery shallow,
finite disturbances in a systemcan providea criterionfor non-
asseenin manydischarging saltlakes[Macumber,1983,1991].
linear stability,taking the form of a lower bound to an insta-
On the other hand, the flux-controlledconditionof Homsyand
bility parametersuchas the boundarylayer Rayleighnumber
Sherwood[1976]is similarto the naturalconditionsfoundon a
Ra definedin (21), belowwhichthe systemis definitelystable.
"dry" salt lake, where saltsare beingprecipitatedby evapora-
This is an important supplementto linearized perturbation
tion from the groundwater.As alreadydiscussed, conditionsat
analysisthat can be used to calculatean upper bound, above
whichthe systemis definitelyunstable.Becauseof the symme- the surfaceof many salt lakesvary in time betweenthesetwo
cases.
try of self-adjointproblems,the boundsobtainedby thesetwo
different methodscan be expectedto coincide.However, for In the following sectionswe examine experimentallyand
non-self-adjointproblemsthe calculatedboundsare separated numerically the extension of one-dimensionalideas to the
by a regionin which subcriticalinstabilitymay be encountered, more realistic two-dimensionalflow geometry implied in the
perhaps dependingupon the nature of finite perturbations "dry" lake system shownin Figure 1. At the lake bed surface
present. distantfrom the margin,the boundarylayeris assumedto grow
In a stabilityanalysis,we usuallyconsiderthe growthrate of from zero thickness, as for the one-dimensional initial-value
wavelikeinstabilitiesin the boundarylayer. These are param- problem describedin Appendix C. Owing to the presenceof
eterizedby the wavenumberwhich,from (21), can be nondi- throughflow and alsothe effectsat the lake margin,we expect
mensionalizedrelative to either the equilibrium boundary unstablebehaviorto ariseat boundarylayer Rayleighnumbers
layer thickness& [Wooding,1960b;Homsyand Sherwood,1976] below thosepredictedby small-perturbationstabilityanalysis.
Evaporation an angle 0 to the horizontal as indicated in the end view, in

Figure 4c.
A
Platesla
and lb showthe upperone third (approximately)
:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::
.....,.•......,..•.
_____.•.•
b of the first Hele-Shaw cell used,for which the geometryfol-
lowed that of Figure 4. Free evaporationwas allowedalong
boundary/lB (see Figure 4a), while a constantpressure
boundaryalongCD wassuppliedby inflowfrom a horizontal,
graduated capillary tube. This experimental design corre-
spondsmostcloselyto the "dry" saltlake boundarycondition.
Evaporativeconcentrationof solutesalong/lB resultedin the
developmentof a boundarylayer of densefluid overlyingthe
"regional"water entering along CD. The remainingbound-
arieswere sealedto preventflow.A secondHele-Shawcellwas
alsoconstructed(experimentalseries3, in Table 1) that cor-
respondedto the firstcell togetherwith its mirror imagein the
line/iF, givinga "doubleinput" configuration.This wasused
to verifythe validityof the flow symmetryassumptions implicit
in the designof the firstcell and alsoto showthat doublingthe
lengthof the evaporationboundarydid not significantlyalter
the stabilitycharacteristics. While the aspectratiosL of these
cells(2 and 4) were muchsmallerthan thoselikely to occurin
Figure 4. Geometryof Hele-Shawcellsusedin experimental
natural groundwatersystems[Duffyand/ll-Hassan, 1988],the
series1 and2 (Table 1), with evaporationassumed uniformat
/lB and with constant-pressure rechargeat CD. Broken lines sideboundariesdid not impede individualearly time plume
signifystreamlinesof a base flow calculatednumericallyas- development.They were, however, found to provide some
suminguniform inflow at CD. The cell used in series3 was horizontal constraint on macroscale convective circulation.
"reflected" in/iF. The only variablesthat could be adjustedconvenientlyto
covera rangeof valuesof R • were the evaporationrate and the
angleof the cell from the horizontal,0. Wooding[1960b]de-
rived a boundarylayer Rayleighnumberfor a uniformupflow
Experimental Analysis of Boundary Layer which,in a Hele-Shawcell tilted at angle 0 to the horizontal,
Growth and Stability reduces to the form
Hele-Shaw Experiments
As analyticalresultsfor the stabilityof the boundarylayer
were not availablein two dimensions,we conductedanalog
R•=--
Ap
[#k
--+•
12rl• sin
0 d:]Pr
(23)
experimentsusingHele-Shaw cells to test the applicabilityof where Ap = Pm -- Pt, Pm beingthe maximumdensityin the
the one-dimensional resultsto more realisticsalinelake geom- boundarylayer and Pr the densityof the bulk fluid; •'r is the
etries.Figure 4 showsa tilted Hele-Shawmodel, basedon the dynamicviscosityof the bulk fluid, while • is the dimensioned
idealized salinelake systemshownin Figure 1. The cell con- evaporation
rate,andk - b2/12istheintrinsic
permeability
of
sistedof two transparentperspexplatesspacedabout0.2 mm the cell.We emphasizethat b is the plate spacingof the cell as
apart, the spacermaterial (shaded)alsoservingas an imper- previouslydefined.In (23) the contributionsto R s of both
meableboundary.Actual dimensionsof the flow spaceshown gravity and viscositycontrastshave been included. However,
in Figures4a and 4b are givenin Table 1. The cell wastilted at for most of the experimentsdiscussedbelow, as well as for
Table 1. Hele-Shaw Cell Parameters
ExperimentalSeries
1 2 3 All
Cell input configuration single single double -..

Cell depthH, m ......... 0.75 x 10-•
Cell lengthLH, m 1.5x 10-• 1.5x 10-• 3.0 x 10-• ...
Cell evaporation lengthLeH, m 0.5 x 10-• 0.5 x 10-• 1.0 x 10-• ...
Cell platespacing b, m 2.1 X 10-4 2.0 X 10-4 1.7X 10-4 '''
Cell intrinsicpermeability
b2/12, m2 3.68X 10-9 3.33X 10-9 2.41X 10-9 ''-
InflowfluiddensityPt, g/cm3
20øC ......... 1.0646
25øC ......... 1.0630
Saturated
fluiddensityPsat,
g/cm3
20øC ......... 1.0814
25øC ......... 1.0863
Kinematicviscosity
of inflowvr, m2/s,at ......... 1.036X 10-6
20øC
DiffusionCoefficient
D•u, m2/s,K2SO4at ......... 0.9 X 10-9
20øC
b
Plate 1. Developmentof fingersin the salineboundarylayer below a solutionsurfaceevaporatingat the
edgeof a Hele-Shawcell,with flow geometryas shownin Figure 4. Parameters:Rs = 2200 and R s = 29.4,
at dimensionless
elapsedtimesT of (a) 1.5, (b) 2.4.
most natural salt lake systems,the secondterm in bracketsin instabilities in the absenceof salt, while experiments 1-2
(23) wasconsiderably smallerthan the first andcanbe ignored. through 1-9 were conductedsolelyto determine visuallythe
The experimentswere conductedin a constanttemperature Rayleighcriterianecessary for the onsetof instabilities.Exper-
room (20øC _+ 1ø),but relative humiditiesdid vary between iments in series2 were conductedto provide validation data
experimentalruns, resultingin slightlydifferent evaporation for the numericalsimulations.They were video taped to (1)
rates.When necessary, the evaporationrate wasalsoincreased further define critical stability, (2) provide data on critical
by placinga smallfan near the evaporationsurfaceto increase wavelengthat the onsetof instability,and (3) record qualita-
vapor transfer.Velocity effectsinducedat the surfacewere not tively the general convectivebehaviorat longer times.
consideredsignificant.The angleof the cell wasadjustedvia a The derivationof (23) for salt-drivenbuoyancydoes not
frame and levelingsystemwith angleincrementsof 1ø. includethe effectsof thermallydriveninstabilities.In particu-
The fluid usedin the experimentswas8% by weight K2SO4. lar, the evaporatingsurfacecouldinducethermal gradientsby
The saturated
densityof K2SO4 at 20øCis 1.0814g/cm
3. The coolingdue to the latent heat flux at the evaporationboundary.
use of an initially dense ambient solution reduced the time Experimentally,the additionof dyed solutionmay alsogener-
needed to develop the boundary layer and also to reach an ate density gradientsowing to the additional small mass of
upper bound on the densitycontrast(Zip). The pertinentcell methylene blue in the solution.These two effectsshouldbe
geometricaland fluid propertiesfor each of the experimental additive. To determine the impacts of these factors on the
series are included in Table 1. boundarylayer stability,experiment1-1 was conductedwith
The behaviorof the boundarylayer wasobservedby inject- distilledwater asthe solutionand with a high evaporationrate
ing a small quantityof 8% K2SO4solutiondyed with a small to maximizethe thermal gradient.If p,• - Pr is small enough,
amountof methyleneblue (100 g of solutionto 0.1 g methylene then the Rayleighnumber,R 8, shouldbe smalland the bound-
blue) into the cell along the evaporatingboundary.This re- ary layer shouldbe stable.This wasverified experimentallyas
sultedin an approximately10-mm-deepdyedzone at the evap- the dyed solution was advectedupwardsto the evaporation
oration boundary.The behaviorof the dye wasvisuallynoted boundaryand remained there for the duration of the experi-
to determine the boundary layer development,and Plate 1 ment(287 min). It wasconcludedthereforethat both thermal
illustratesthe developmentof instabilityin an earlyversionof gradientsderivedfrom the evaporativecoolingand anydensity
the cell. Subsequentanalysesof high-resolutionvideo records gradientsresultingfrom the methyleneblue were insignificant
provided estimatesof initial wavelengths. in the developmentof an unstableboundarylayer. Marangoni
instabilityeffectsinducedby the temperature dependenceof
Experiments on Critical Stability surfacetensioncould alsobe considerednegligible.
Preliminarystudieswere conductedto investigatethe con- To determine critical stability,the eight visual experiments
vective behavior of the model and consisted of two series of (1-2 through1-9) were conductedover a rangeof evaporation
experiments,numberedfrom 1-1 to 1-9 and from 2-1 to 2-11. rates and angles.The experimentaldata from these experi-
The experimentaldesignfollowed that of the Hele-Shaw cell ments is shown in Table 2. During the later stagesof some
shownin Figure 4. Experiment 1-1 was intendedto searchfor experiments,the evaporationrate increased,apparentlyowing
Table 2. ExperimentalDetails of Critical StabilityExperiments

Scale
Rayleigh
Velocity Number
Cell Evaporation
Angle Rate •, m/s x
Experiment 0, deg m/sX 106 l0 s R* Rs? Stable
1-1 2 1.2 0 0 0 yes
1-2 1 3.3 1.03 3.1 858 yes
1-3 2 4.1 1.92 4.7 1643 yes
1-4 2 3.3 1.92 5.8 1598 yes
1-5 2 2.3 2.07 8.9 1721 no
1-6 3 1.96 2.87 14.7 2395 no
1-7 3 1.87 3.10 16.5 2581 no
1-8 4 1.96 3.69 18.8 3075 no
1-9 2 0.86 1.95 22.8 1623 no
*Boundarylayer.
?Cell.
to precipitationof r2so 4 on the top of the cell, which in- densefluidsmovedagainstthe backgroundflow until encoun-
creasedthe surfacearea overwhichevaporationoccurred.The tering the vertical boundaryDE.
evaporationrate usedto calculateR • in Table 3 wastherefore Eleven additional experimentsnear critical stability were
taken as the evaporationrate at the time of formationof the video recorded(series2) for later evaluation.The data for
first instabilities.Temperature compensationwas includedin theseexperimentsare shownin Table 3 and includethe wave-
all densityterms. However, changesin viscosityand diffusion length )t and the wavenumbera, which were estimatedfrom
coefficientdue to differencesin the cell temperaturebetween the video recording.The critical wavenumbersderived theo-
experimentswere ignored, as these changeswere small over reticallyby Wooding[1960b]and Homsyand Sherwood[1976]
the temperaturerangeencountered,andthe propertiesat 20øC were a - 0.4285 and 0.759, respectively.At the first appear-
were used. ance of fingersthe averagewavelengthof the instabilitieswas
In the first three reportedexperimentswith buoyancyforc- measureddirectlyfrom the videotapeimage.Severalestimates
ing shownin Table 2 (1-2, 1-3, and 1-4), stableboundarylayers of the wavelengthwere made for each experiment.
developed,suggesting that the criticalvalue of R• was above In the first four experimentsshownin Table 3 (2-1 through
5.8. Beginningwith experiment1-5, however,unstablebound- 2-4) the critical Rayleighnumberwas not exceededand the
ary layersoccurredduringthe courseof the experiment.The boundarywas stable.Experiment2-5 was the first experiment
minimum Rayleigh number where instabilityformed was 8.9. to showsome boundarylayer instabilities.These instabilities
Theseinstabilitiestook the form of fingers,first of a verysmall formed at a Rayleighnumberof 5.6, well below the minimum
wavelength,which over time became dominated by several linear criteria suggested by both Wooding[1960b]and Homsy
large fingers.Qualitatively,the behaviorcorresponded to that and Sherwood[1976].The instabilitiesformedin 2-5 may have
shownby Wooding[1969]and Greenand Foster[1975]for flow beenfinite amplitudeinstabilitiesthat are not accountedfor in
in a Hele-Shawcell. These large fingersmovedto the bottom the linear stabilityapproaches.The instabilitiesdid form very
of the cell while at the sametime generallymovingtowardthe near the energy method criterion of Homsy and Sherwood
boundaryAF (Figure 4a). The dominantfingersgrewby cap- (Ra -- 5.77). It is interestingto note that both experiments
turing smallerones.Upon reachingthe bottomof the cell, the 1-4 and 2-4 at Ra = 5.6 were stable.Given the experimental
uncertainties,the agreement is quite good. The agreement
suggests that the experimentalRayleighnumbershave uncer-
Table 3. ExperimentalDetails of Critical Wavenumber taintiesof approximately+ 0.2.
Experiments In experiment2-5 and the followingexperimentsin Table 3,
the boundary layer was clearly unstable and critical wave-
Rayleigh lengthswere measured.The wavenumbera rangedfrom 0.550
Cell Number
Angle Wavelength Wavenumber to 1.526and generallyincreasedmonotonicallyasthe Rayleigh
Experiment 0, deg R• Rs? ,•, mm a number increased.
The experimentalresultsshowthe applicabilityof the type
2-1 1 2.3 800 oc 0
2-2 1 3.2 800 oc 0 of stabilityanalysisproposedboth by Wooding[1960b]and by
2-3 1 4.2 800 oc 0 Homsy and Sherwood[1976] to the simple two-dimensional
2-4 1 5.6 800 oc 0 salinelake systemconsidered.The resultsindicatethat a stable
2-5 1 5.6 800 6.25 0.526
boundarylayer can definitelydevelopexperimentallywhenthe
2-6 2 8.9 1600 4.8 0.550
2-7 3 12.1 2400 3.4 0.702
ratio of buoyancyflux to evaporativeflux Ra doesnot exceed
2-8 3 13.1 2400 4.2 0.612 approximately6.
2-9 5 23.5 4000 3.4 0.815 The extensionto two dimensionsis promising from the
2-10 4 35.8 3200 3.4 1.526
standpointof predictivebehavior.The primaryreasonfor the
2-11 5 40.1 4000 3.4 1.385
agreementis the apparent dominanceof vertical flow in the
*Boundarylayer. two-dimensionalcaseover most of the evaporatingboundary.
?Cell. Observationof the finger developmentclearly showedthat
most of the flow was oriented vertically acrossthe boundary. A

As the instabilitiesmoved downwardfrom the boundary, the
trajectorybeganto deviatesignificantly
from the verticalonly
when they were well below the evaporativelayer.
Numerical Simulations Compared

to Experimental Results
The nature of the unstable flows observed in the Hele-Shaw
cell experimentshasbeen describedin the precedingsection.
The numericalmodel simulatedthe sameproblemin terms of
a discretizedapproximationto a two-dimensional classicalfor-
b
mulation,usingthe Boussinesq form of (13) and (14), which
can alsobe deriveddirectlyfrom (A1)-(A3), in AppendixC.
Since this derivation is without reference to Hele-Shaw flow, it
providesa usefulcomparison. However,for testson the influ-
enceof dispersion,a dispersivitytensorbasedon Taylor dis-
persion(equation(20)) was incorporatedas an option.
The numericalproblem was designedto follow the same
flow geometryas the Hele-Shawcell (Figure 4a). Here the
valuesof L and L e can be obtainedfrom Table 1. The two-
dimensionalflow regionABCDEF was modelledwith a rect-
angularmeshof squarecells,usuallyeither 256 x 128 (desig-
nated mesh 1) or 512 x 256 cells (designatedmesh 2).
Assuminguniformevaporationalongthe boundary(the "dry"
salt lake condition),we integrated(16) to derive a Dirichlet
conditionon the streamfunction ½. Then, with an upflow of
dimensionless strengthE = 1/Ra = constant,we have
On AB ½ = -EX (0 -< X --<L e, Y = 1)
On BC ½ -- -EL e (Le -< X _<L - L e)
On CD ½ = -E(L - X) (L -- L e • X • L) (24)
Figure 5. Early appearanceof instabilityin a growingsaline
On EF ½=0 (0_<X_<L,Y=0) boundarylayerwith uniformevaporationalong/lB (Figure 4)
accordingto the numericalmodelusingmesh2. (a) Contours
On DE and FA ½ = O.
of S = 0.1(0.1)0.9, (b) contoursof dimensionless absolute
The dashedstreamlinesin Figure 4a indicatethe solutionof flow rate IuI - 0.05(0.05)0.25,
(c) streamlines
of the overall
Laplace'sequationfor ½,valid in an assumedinitial statewith flow 4 = -0.0095(0.0005)0.Parameters(a), (b) and (c): Rs =
3200, Ra = 80, appliednoiselevel0.005, T = 0.7; (d) asfor
the salinityeverywhereconstant(S = 0). The solutionused
(a) with zero applied noise, T = 1.3. In (c) the top left
Fourier expansionmethodsinvolvingseveralhundredterms. quadrantof the total flow field is shown.
Note that a uniform normal componentof flow that differs
from the constant-pressure situationof the Hele-Shawcell was
alsoassumed alongCD. (The differenceon the segmentCD was
Minor differenceswere involved in the experimental and
not consideredto be importantto the evaporationproblemon
numericaltechniquesused.In the numericalmodel,parameter
/lB, wherethe experimental andnumericalconditions matched.)
values could be preset, and a low-level Gaussiannoise se-
Thisinitial-flowsolutionwassuperimposed duringthe calculation
quence,if used to trigger an unstableflow or to simulate a
of the time-dependent numericalsolution,usingthe linearityof
hydrodynamically "noisy"situation,could be used repeatedly
the Poissonequationderivedfrom (13) [Roache,1982].
without changeof the initial random-noise"seed."
To matchthe "dry" lake salinityboundaryconditionsof the
In all the experimentalseries,parameterscould be preset
experiments,we assumeda buildup of surfacesalinityuntil
roughlyand were measuredsubsequently in the courseof the
saturation(S = 1) wasreached,andused(18) and(19) to give
experiments.The amountof noise,if present,was difficultto
On/lB E(S + St)= Rs-•OS/OY(0 <- •'-< assess and could include a contribution from the salt crust that
formed alongthe evaporationboundary/lB. Some effectsof
S= 1 (r>rs) noise are discussed later.
On BC OS/On = 0
The Early-Time Boundary Layer Instability
On CD S = 0 (25) Figure 5 illustratesthe numerical simulationof the first
appearanceof secondaryconvectiveflow in an unstablesaline
On DE, EF, and FA OS/On = 0 boundary layer, formed by uniformly distributedsteady up-
InABCDEF 0 -< S -< 1 (0 -< X _<L, 0 -< Y -< 1) ward evaporation at the boundary of a "dry" salt lake. In
Figure 5a the contoursrepresentdimensionless densityS in
where O/Onsignifiesthe normal derivative. the boundarylayer abovethe backgrounddensity,Figure 5b
showscontoursof the scalarmodulusof secondaryflow speed locked to the leading edge of the boundary layer and had
[U[,usefulin estimating
the significance
of dispersion,
while formed a small steadystate eddy circulationwithout growth.
Figure 5c showsstreamlinesdue to the backgroundflow and The eddy becameprogressively
smallerasR a was further de-
secondaryconvectiveflow. In this casea numericalGaussian creased.
noisesignalof meanamplitude0.005wasappliedto S at points These numericalruns were repeated with added Gaussian
one meshwide below the top surfaceat the start of eachtime white noiseof amplitude0.005 distributedhorizontallyin the
step,and the samesignalwassubtractedat the end of the time boundarylayer, as describedpreviously.In this case,waves
stepbeforereplacementwith a newpart of the noisesequence. were presentdownto R a = 9.6.
The contrastingcase,withoutappliednoise,is shownin Figure Besidesbeing broadly in agreementwith the experimental
5d for comparisonwith Figure 5a. findings,theseresultsare consistentwith the lower bound of
Two importantearlyconvectivefeaturesare visiblein Figure R a = 5.77, found by Homsyand Sherwood[1976] usingthe
5, the first being an asymmetricplume, which developedclose energymethod.Although the latter resultwasobtainedfor an
to the marginof the evaporationzone (B in Figure5a). This assumeduniformverticalupflowwith uniformconditionsalong
was initiated by the high horizontal densitygradientthat de- the horizontalboundary,its value as an estimateof parametric
velopedat the leadingedgeof the boundarylayer, and consti- limitsin our two-dimensional geometrywasalsoevident.
tuted a strongfinite amplitudeperturbation.In their numerical
model,ReesandBassom[1993]obtaineda similarplumein the
neighborhoodof a cornerbetweena verticalinsulatedsurface
and a horizontal surface where the temperature had been
raised suddenly.We have observedthe plume experimentally
(Plate 1), but our experimentalarrangementinvolvedan air-
flow stagnationpoint at the cornerB (Figure 4a), reducing
evaporationthere so that the singularitytended to be weak-
ened at low evaporationrates.
A secondfeatureof Figure5a is the train of smallwavesthat
appearedalong the boundarylayerAB. Potentially,this is of
considerablesignificancesincethe drivinginstabilitycan form
over the area of a salt lake, for which the ratio of horizontal
scaleto depth is usuallyvery high. The numericallygenerated
unstablewaveswere very similarto thoseseenin the labora-
tory experiments.An appreciableamount of time elapsedbe-
fore thesesmallwavesbecamevisible,suggesting a disturbance
modethat becameunstableonly after somediffusivespreading
has occurred. The average wavelengthappeared to remain
practicallyconstantwhile the disturbanceamplitudewasfinite
but small.
Critical Stability
A numericalstudyto examinecriticalstabilitypropertiesfor
this "dry" salt lake systemprovideda usefulcomparisonwith
the experimentalresultsreported in Tables 2 and 3 in the
previoussection.We followedthe exampleshownin Figure5,
where the numerical mesh 2 was used, with Rs = 3200. In
each case the model was taken over the dimensionless time
range T = 0 to 1, for eachgivenvalue of R a. The correspond-
ing maximumvaluesof r = Rs/R2arangedfrom about14 to
128. A numerical random noise signal was not applied, al-
thoughbackgroundnumericalnoisecould not be discounted.
Figure 6 showsthe calculatedsalinebotindarylayer for se-
lectedvaluesof R a in the range from 15 down to 6. There was
not any notable changein passingthroughthe critical eigen-
value R a = 14.3, but the early growth rate evidentlywas
diminishedin the range of R a below 10. At R a = 9.8, only the
large eddy originally formed below B together with a few
locally inducedwaveshad appearedeven when the final di-
mensionless time had been increased to T = 2. For this and
lower values of R a the unstablewave pattern was not seen.
This is in reasonablygood agreementwith the experimental
observations in Tables 2 and 3, where waves were observed
Figure 6. Numerical calculationof a growingsalinebound-
consistentlydown to R a = 8.9. ary layer in the macroscopicflow configurationof Figure 4, at
For R a > 8.9 the strongplume generatedat the marginB Rs = 3200 and time T - 1. Boundarylayer Rayleighnumber
grewin amplitudewith time whilebeingadvectedto the left by Ra: (a) 14.3, (b) 11.0, (c) 9.9, (d) 9.8, (e) 9.5, (f) 9.0,
the macroscaleflow. However, at Ra = 8.9 the plume was (#) 8.95, (h) 8.90.
Comparison With the Case of One-Dimensional Upfiow Pointswere plotted for given 12uby settingRs to each of the
A comparison of the two-dimensional resultsin Figure6 with followingvalues:3200and 4000usingmesh1 (256 x 128) and
the equivalent"one-dimensional" configurationof the uniform 2400 and 3200 usingmesh2 (512 x 256). In the caseof the
verticalupflowis importantto establishthe relevanceof theoret- Hele-Shawcell the experimentaldata covereda range of pa-
icalwork alreadydiscussed.A similarstudywascarriedout with rametervaluesinvolvingR 8 betweenabout5.6 and 150,andRs
thetwo-dimensional
"regional
flow"replaced
bya uniformver- betweenabout1600and 4900,providingconsiderable param-
tical upflowevaporatingthroughthe completeupperboundary, eter overlapwith the numericalstudy.
with appliednoise.Again,consistent waveinstabilitywasencoun- We considerfirst the numericalresultsin Figure 7 where we
tered, this time disappearing below aboutR8 = 9.8. Measured usedmesh2 with applied noiseof amplitude0.{)05to trigger
wavenumbers for valuesof R8 closeto criticalare shownin Figure instabilitywhen the boundarylayerthicknesshad exceededthe
7 to be in good agreementwith the two-dimensionalresults, critical value. Here it is important to note that the measured
providingnumericalconfirmationthat the one-dimensional re- numericalwavenumbersapparentlydefinedthe samecurveof
sultsare valid awayfrom a lake margin. a-R8 dependencefor both Rs values shown.The a depen-
dencewas small for large Rs, that is, for small upflow, and
Comparison of Experimental and Numerical would be closeto the a value for a diffusingboundarylayer
Wavenumber Measurements without upflow.At low R8 (high upflow rates), however,the
We continuewith the initial-valueproblemwhere the saline wavelengthX of the instabilityappearedto be closelyscaledto the
boundarylayer growsfrom uniform startingconditions.Useful boundarylayerthickness& In that casetherewaslittle variation
informationabout the unstablesystemcan be deducedfrom of the wavenumber a (definedin (22a)), while from (22b) the
measurementsof wavenumberfor valuesof R 8 exceedingthe wavenumber
a • R[ •, in apparent
agreement
withFigure7.
criticalvaluefor the equilibriumlayer as definedby perturba-
tion theory.This is the rangeof weak upflowand musttend to Upper Wavenumber Limit in Models
the zero-upflowcasein the limit R 8 --> o•. Clearly, instability In Figure 7, resultsobtainedusingthe coarsermesh 1 pro-
couldbe expectedto intervenebefore the boundarylayer has vide a contrast to those of mesh 2 discussed above. Mesh 1
reachedequilibrium. exhibited an overall decrease in the numerical values of a with
Figure7 showsvaluesof the initialwavenumbera ( = a/Rs) eachincreaseof Rs; that is, the wavelengthX appearednot to
at the onset of instabilityplotted versusRs, superimposing scaleto 12u,as we assumedin Figure 7. Moreover, the exper-
resultsboth from the Hele-Shawcell experimentsand from the imental data appearedto exhibit similar properties.From Ta-
numericalmodel. In the assumedabsenceof dispersiona = ble 3 there is evidencethat the wavelengthin the Hele-Shaw
2rrl2u/Xfrom (22b), where12u= H/Rs from (7). A Gaussian cell had a lower limit for Rs -> 2400 of about 3.4 mm, or 16
random-noisesequenceof mean amplitude 0.005 in S was timesthe cell plate spacingb definedin Figure 4b. This prop-
appliedat a level one meshwide below the upper boundary. erty is apparentin Figure 7 for the scaledexperimentaldata.
While a physicalexplanationisuncertain,the cell-platespacing
controlsthe three-dimensionalhydrodynamics of flow in the
0.10 I I I
cell, and the stronggravitycomponent normalto the cell (Fig-
+2 ure 4) couldhavemodifiedthe flow of an inhomogeneous
fluid.
0.08 Considerthe linearizedstabilityequationsobtainablein the

usualway by perturbingthe Boussinesqapproximateform of
(A1)-(A3), assuming (for simplicity)a uniformupwardflowof
dimensionless strengthE -- s/uc = 1/R 8 due to evaporation.
0.06
These linear equationscan be scaledin terms of either the
boundarylayer thickness& or the diffusionlength 12u,and in
0.04 - oo+gx5
_10• o o • o•9
o -
eachcasethe equationsinvolveonly the parameterR 8- Hence
the dimensionless wavenumbera or a should depend only
11 1110•3 3 uponR 8. However,if we definea new Rayleigh-P6cletnumber
13 x10
b b
0.02
Rb= G= RsH (26)
and rescalethe perturbationequationsin terms of the length
I I I
b, the first-orderperturbationto the equation of motion is
50 100 150
unchanged,but the perturbation to the transport equation
R6 yields
Figure 7. Initial wavenumbers
a (= a/R8 = 2rrl,•/X) from Os OS 1 Os 1
experimentaland numerical measurementsversusboundary
layerRayleighnumberRs. Valuesof Rb (equation(26)) are 0 + v+ o-K
=R7V (27)
displayed
besideplotted points.Experimental
(Hele-Shaw)se- where s and v denote small perturbationsto the densityand
ries: 1, pluses;2, crosses;3, asterisks.Numerical model: Mesh
1:Rs = 3200 (opencircles)and4000(opensquares).Mesh2: verticalcomponentof the flow rate, and Tb and Y• designate
Rs = 2400 (open diamonds),3200 (open triangles),3200 appropriatenew independentvariables.This two-dimensional
(zeronoise)(solidtriangles),3200(uniformverticalflow) (sol- representation must be qualitative because of the three-
id circles);theoreticalcriterionandequilibriumboundarylayer dimensionalityof the Hele-Shaw flow but servesto demon-
[Homsyand Sherwood,1976](solidsquares). stratea possible
dependence of thedynamics onthecellspac-
ing. In Figure 7 approximatevalues of R•, have been found For most salinelake systems,A p/p,. is lessthan 0.3, while the
from (26) usingTable 1 to label the experimentalpoints.Al- evaporationrate e is seldomless than 0.1 m/yr [Allisonand
thoughthere is significantscatter,the experimentalR t, values Barnes,1985]. Using a freshwaterkinematicviscosityand the
showa trend increasingin the directionof decreasinga values. experimentallyand numericallyestimatedcritical boundary
Further discussionson factors affectingthe observedwave- layer Rayleigh number of order 10, we find the minimum
numbers are given in two appendices.Effects of numerical permeabilityneededto supportconvective behaviorto be ap-
aliasingand noiseare discussed in AppendixA. In AppendixB proximately 10-14m2.
we considerbriefly the possibleeffectof Taylor dispersionin This permeabilityis typicallyfound in siltsor sandyclaysand
the Hele-Shaw cell. clearlyconfinesconvectionto salinelake groundwatersystems
comprisedof reasonablycoarselytexturedsediments.A possi-
ble exceptionmay be found in highly saline claysand salts,
Conclusions where the high salinityresultsin clay flocculation.Such sedi-
Evaporationof groundwatercontainingdissolvedsaltsat a ments may have much higher permeabilitiesthan would be
"dry" groundwater dischargesurface readily causesa saline expectedand could therefore supportconvection.
buildupuntil solutionsaturationoccurs,followedby precipita- For the "dry"lake boundaryconditions,parametersrelevant
tion of salt. Generally, salt diffusion-dispersion rates are low to modelperformancehavebeen deducedby measuringinitial
relative to transportof salt by fluid flow. Consequently,the wavelengths,A, of instabilitiesappearingin the salineboundary
zone of high salinityis limited initially to a thin layer adjacent layer. These becomevisible at low velocitieswhen hydrody-
to the surface,a boundarylayer. The fluid densitygradientis namic dispersionis still small. If a small amount of random
likely to be very steepand is potentiallyunstablein a gravita- noiseis present,it is found from Figure 7, for boundarylayer
tional sense.This is a situationin whichconvectivefingeringis RayleighnumbersR • coveringquite a wide range of unstable
very likely to occur. Convectivefingeringaffectsmixing pro- values, that the initial wavenumber a is close to the theoretical
cessesespeciallyby extensionof interfacesand requires de- valuepredictedby Homsyand Sherwood[1976]for a neutrally
tailed modeling. Here the comparisonof a numerical model stable steadystate boundarylayer. Note here that the wave-
with a Hele-Shaw model providesa useful test for both. Al- number a definedin (22b) is scaledto the diffusionlength
thoughthe modelsconsideredhere are two-dimensional,many l,u = D,u/u c and not to 15,the boundarylayer thickness.
of the conclusions for the numerical model can be extended to We can rearrange (22b) and substitutesuccessively for
three dimensions. l•t and uc to obtain
Two types of idealized boundaryconditionhave been de- 2 'n'DM
scribed.For a ponded conditionit is assumedthat there is a
constantpressureat the surface,and the salinityis constant:
,•• aR•c•---
•- (29)
the caseof a well-mixedpond. For the "dry" lake condition, Then, if R a hasa criticalvalueof order 10, asfor (29), we see
whichis the main topic of this paper, it is assumedthat ground- from Figure 7 that a is likely to be lessthan 0.1. By adopting
water is presentup to the horizontal surface.Evaporationis the other parameter constraintsdiscussedfor (29), we can
assumedto be uniform,inducinga uniformverticalupflowof estimatea value for the initial wavelengthX of a little lessthan
water acrossthe boundary.No salt is transportedacrossthe 2 m on a field scale. This indicates that the ratio of the field-
surface until after solute saturation has been reached, when scalewavelengthto the laboratory-scalewavelengthis of order
saltis precipitatedon the surface.Theseconditionsnecessitate 1000:1.It alsofollowsthat the diffusionlengthl•u = DM/uc •
a small horizontal componentin the subsurfacegroundwater 0.03 m, giving15= R al•u •' 0.3 m for the equilibriumthick-
flow. A constant-pressure condition cannot be satisfiedjust nessof the field boundarylayer.
below the surface, and it is necessaryto assumethat the As the overall Rayleighnumber is raisedin each model, the
phreatic surfaceis maintainedby gravity and by capillarity. diminishingwavelengthultimately tends to a limiting value.
However, the introductionof only a small amount of ponding, This limiting wavelengthappearsto be scaledto the mesh
say,in a localizedregion, may be sufficientto establisha con- element sizein the numericalmodel and may be scaledto the
stant-pressure condition.Thusthe two idealizedsituationspro- plate spacingin the Hele-Shawcell. In the numericalcasethe
posed above may bracket a range of more complexsurface effectprobablyarisesdue to the discretizationof the equations
boundaryconditions. (aliasing)and is enhancedby the presenceof random noise,
Although the stability behavior is complex, the general the shortestwavelengthwhich could appear being about six
times the mesh scale for the numerical scheme used here. This
agreementof one-dimensionallinear stabilityanalysiswith the
onset of stabilityin the idealized two-dimensionalsalinelake propertyof the limiting wavelengthis an importantconsider-
systemis encouragingand providesusefulinsightsinto predic- ation generallysincediscretizingequationsfor numericalpur-
tive behavior. The experimentalresults indicated boundary posesmustintroducea lengthscalethat is not necessarily part
layer stabilityfor Rs less than order 10 for all casesinvesti- of the physicalproblembeingmodeled.
gated.As shownfrom (21c), usingUc = 'ygk/t'r, Rs is pro- These studiesindicate some of the advantagesand limita-
portional to the sedimentpermeabilityand inverselypropor- tions of small-scalelaboratory experimentsand numerical
tional to the rate of evaporation,the former being highly modelingwhen attemptingto simulatemuchlarger scalefield
variable, while evaporationin actual salinelakes is generally phenomena.For the "dry" lake casewe haveshownby numer-
constrained.Taking viscosityto be constantand rearranging, ical modelingand by experimentthat the analysesof Homsy
we can make an order-of-magnitudeestimateof the minimum and Sherwood[1976] are usefulin estimatingthe initial behav-
permeabilityneededto supportconvectionas ior of instabilities,for a wide range of evaporationrates.For
the pondedcasewe proposethat a similarconclusionshould
/•'rR •ce be valid, startingwith the results of Wooding[1960b]. Both
krnir•
• (28)
modelingapproacheshave drawn attention to a tendencyfor
instabilityto be triggeredfirst at the leadingedge of the saline Similar measurementsof wavelength using mesh 2 were
boundarylayer, correspondingto a salt lake margin. made using applied Gaussiannoise levels of 0.002 and 0.01.
In summary,stabilityconsiderationsare crucial to the un- However,for lM/d • 0.05 theseresultswere very closeto the
derstandingof salinelake groundwatersystems.The dynamics values shown for a noise level of 0.005 and have not been
of the natural systemsare solar driven, that is, evaporative includedin Figure 8. We note that Greenand Foster [1975]
concentrationat the lake surface leads to a gravitationally used a noise level of 0.002.
unstableconcentrationdistribution(concentrationinversion). To examinethe instabilityin a more "quiet" environment,
The onsetof convectivebehavioris governedby the boundary we repeated the numerical measurementsusing mesh 2 with
layerRayleighnumber,a functionof both the atmosphericand zero applied random noise so that the remaining numerical
surfaceconditions(evaporation)andthe subsurface properties
noise would be expectedto arise mainly from the applied
(permeabilityand dispersion). "regional" flow. For lM/d • 0.05 the onset of instabilitywas
delayedsignificantly,allowinga thicker boundarylayer to de-
velop,asillustratedin the exampleof Figure 5d. The measured
Appendix A: Influence of Numerical Aliasing wavelengths,indicatedby solidsymbolsin Figure 8, apparently
and Noise
define a steeperstraightline than wasfound in the presenceof
In the numerical schemethe upper limit to wavenumbers applied random noise. Further, this line intersectedthe Md
that can be modeled dependson the finite mesh scale and axisat about 1, indicatingthat residualdispersionwas signifi-
couldbe influencedalsoby the nature of the algorithmsused. cantlyreducedafter removal of the applied noise.
However, there are resemblancesbetween the superficialef- In Figure 8 both data setswith applied noise show a fairly
fects of the additional parameters in the two modeling ap- sharp transition to a constantX/d • 6, when l•/d was less
proaches.Taking d as the characteristicmeshwidth, we have than about 0.05. Since the data was scaled to mesh size, it
used the numerical model to find early values of the scaled appearedto be a propertyof the discretizationof the equations
wavelengthAid versusl•r/d, holdingR• constant.These re- and would arise in other numericalschemes,generallyneces-
suits are shownin Figure 8 for R• = 80 (a near-midrange sitatingadequaterefinementof numericalmeshes.(When dis-
value),usingmesh1 with the macroscopic RayleighnumberRs cussing their numerical model of convection in a two-
coveringthe range 1600 to 4000, and mesh2 with Rs covering dimensional porous medium, Green and Foster [1975]
the rangefrom 1600to 19,200.Here the open symbolsindicate recommendedmaintaining no fewer than 10-12 mesh ele-
data obtainedwith appliedGaussiannoiseas before. (At the mentsper wavelengthto ensurethat the wavelengthstabilizes.)
larger valuesof l•r/d there was significantscatterin the mea- In the present numerical model with applied noise, a wave-
suredvaluesof Md, indicatedby pairsof "typical"points,and length equivalentto about six meshwidths appearedwhen the
arisingfrom the relativelysmallnumberof wavesthat couldfit mostunstablewavelengthassociated with the physicalproblem
along the finite boundary layer.) In the case of these two was equal to, or shorter than, this minimum value. Then the
meshes,d differedby a factor of 2, but the two data setswith perturbationwave pattern appearedto be "locked,"suggesting
applied noise scaledtogether quite well. For l•r/d > 0.05 that theseshorterwavelengthscorrespondedto a rangewhere
approximately,Aid appearedto increaselinearlywith l•r/d, numerical aliasingoccurred[Reesand Bassom,1993]. Mea-
and a straight-linefit to the data intersectedthe Md axisat a sured minimum values of Md for mesh 2 at Rs = 80 were
positivevalue of around 3, probablyowingto residualdisper- approximately6.35 at noiselevel 0.005 and 6.05 at noiselevel
sion enhancedby noise. 0.002 (not shownin Figure 8).
The behaviorof the numericalmodel usingmesh2 with zero
appliednoiseis alsoshownin Figure8 for l•/d • 0.05.In thiscase
2O Rs was taken as far as 19,200,and Md appearedto approacha
limit close to 5, probablyowing primarily to aliasingwith the
addedeffectof residualnumericalnoise.In thisrangeof highRs
the modelbehavedstablywhile the perturbationamplitudewas
15 small,but numericalinstabilitywas detectedat later times.
Many of the resultsobtainedat Rs = 3200 and Rs = 4000
using mesh 1 in Figure 7 appeared to fall into the "constant
wavelength"range shownin Figure 8, which scaledwith d but
• 10 not with l,•. From Figure 8 it is evident that the "cutoff"
wavelengthfor mesh 1 was about 6d = 6H/128 • 3.5 mm,
whichis closeto the value of 3.4 mm noted experimentallyfor
the Hele-Shawcell (Table 3). Using the apparentcorrespon-
5
denceof mesh1 with the scalingin the experimentalresults,we
have calculated "equivalent" R•, values for the numerically
derivedpointsusing(26) with the known quantitiesb/H and
d/H. The two values of Rs used with mesh 1 give two R•,
0 i i i
0 0.05 o. 10 o. 15 0.20 values.These have been entered in Figure 7 and show quite
good agreementwith the experimentalvalues.
IM/d Clearly, environmental or artificially applied "noise" is a
Figure8. Scaledwavelength Md versusR• • = lM/d for significant parameter in the triggeringof unstableflowswith
Rs = 80, from the numericalmodel. Mesh 1: open squares. varying base flows. In particular, a porous medium contains
Mesh 2: with appliedrandomnoiselevel0.005,opentriangles; heterogeneitieswhich,in a regionalflow, can generatevelocity
with zero applied noise,solid triangles. "noise"with amplitudeproportionalto flow rate.
Appendix B: PossibleEffect of Taylor Dispersion y=0:S=l y -• •: S -• 0 (A7)

Upon Wavenumbers with the initial condition
From (20) the P6cletnumberof the flow inducedby evap-
orationfor all the Hele-Shawcell experiments,•b/DM did not r= 0 y > 0: S = 0 (A8)
exceedorder 1, givingconditionsapparentlysimilar to those
The substitution
assumedin theorieswhich ignored hydrodynamicdispersion.
This leads easilyto the assumption(made above) that the S(r, y) = e-y/20(r,y) (A9)
dispersionD • D•u, and the earliestwavenumbersobserved
shouldbe predictableby small-perturbation(linear) stability transforms(A6) to the form
theory.However,the perturbationsinducedby instabilitymust
OO 020
have attainedfinite amplitudeby the time that measurements
becamepossible.Also, the perturbationvelocitiesmay grow O•-= Oy 2 1/40 (A10)
rapidly to values approachingUc/2 [Woocling,1969]. Thus
whereO obeysthe sameconditionsasS in (A7) and (A8). The
hydrodynamicdispersionmighthaveinfluencedthe wavenum-
ber measurements. solutionfor the salinitydistributionis
An estimate of the importanceof numericallycalculated S(r, y) = e-y/2©l(r,y) (All)
Taylor dispersionwasmadewhen obtainingthe data shownin
Figure 8. For mesh 2, additional data pointswere obtained where
usingthe discretizedversionof the normalizedTaylor disper-

siontensor,as describedin connectionwith (20). Only for Rs
valuesfrom 6400up couldincreasesin wavelengthbe detected. Ol(r
,y)= 1/2e
-y/2
erfc T1/2 + 1/2e
y/2
erfc
Also found for thesecaseswere the dimensionlessflow speeds
IUI (scaled
withUc)thathadpeakvaluesnot exceeding
0.2to
0.25. Thus the effectof Taylor dispersionappearedto be small andwe seethat S(r, y) tendsto the steadystateform e-Y as
at those early stagesof instabilitygrowth,when the measure- r•.
mentsof wavelengthwere made. The secondcase,that of a "d•" lake bed, involvesa buildup
of salt at the surfaceto saturationfollowedby maintenanceof
that saturationvalue,asdescribed by (18) and(19). The initial
Appendix C: Growth of a Stable Diffusing condition(A8) appliesover the rangey • 0. If saturationis
Boundary Layer in a Uniform Upfiow reachedon the bounda• after a time r = rs the evaporation
bounda• condition(18) togetherwith the conditionat infiniff
We assumethe Boussinesq form of the (8)-(10), with the can be written as
dimensionless parameters•b = M = 1 and 3/= 0 and with D
reducedto a unit tensor, to give the governingequations OS
v.u=0 (A1) O•r•rs:y=O'S+Sr+•=O y•:S•O

VP + jS + u = 0 (A2)
•ter saturation,r > rs, the conditionS = 1 applies.
as 1 Problemsof this ffpe were solvedby Mason and Weaver
a-•+ u. VS= •ssV2S (A3) [1924],Sm• [1951],Braeswr[1973],and others.With condi-
tion (A13), solutionby Laplacetransformgives
For a uniform upflowand boundaryconditionsindependent
S
of the horizontalcoordinatesX andZ, the unperturbedsystem
reducesto the singlegoverningequation Sr= y)
as as 1 o2s where
OT+ E 0-•- RsOY2 (A4)
To solve(A4) explicitlywithin the boundarylayer it is helpful 02(7,
y)= 1/2(r-y + 1)e-y/2
erfc rl/ - 1/2e
y/2
to introducerescaledtime and spacecoordinates
82t
ßerfc
[ + exp 4r (A15)
r= D (A5a)
In equation(A14), S is a smoothlyincreasinghnction of
time, but the equationceasesto hold when salt saturationis
y = H(Ys- Y) D (A5b) reached at the lake surhce, y = 0. At saturationwe have
1
where y is measureddownwardsfrom the surface.Equation
(A4) becomes Sr= O:(•,0) (•6)
as as o2s
The bounda• valueS(r, 0) is thereforeknownfor all time.
0•- Oy Oy2
=0 (A6) It is a continuoushnction, althoughthe derivativesare only
piecewisecontinuous.Then,
For the first case,assumedto be pondedbrine of constant
salinity,the surfaceboundaryconditionsare simply 0 • T • TS:S(T•0): SrO2(T
• 0) T > rs:S(r, 0) = 1 (A17)
SinceDuhamel'stheoremis valid for differentialoperatorsof d scaleof elementsof numericalmesh(L).

the type (A10) [Sheddon,1951;Ogata,1958], the solutionof D dispersivity
tensor,dimensioned
(L2/T) or
the problemcan be written formallyas dimensionless.
D scalarisotropic
dispersivity
(L2/T).
DL, Dr coefficientsof longitudinaland lateral
S(z,
y)=e-y/2
0 •zz S(z',0) ©•(z- z',y) dz' (A18)
dispersion
D•r molecular
(L 2/T).
diffusivity
(L2/T).
The derivativewith respectto the upper limit z vanishesby E evaporationrate, equal to e/Uc = 1/Ra.
virtueof the initial condition(A8). For z -< Zs,S(z, y) is given g gravityvector(L/T2).
by (A14) with (A15). If z > Zs, separatingthe range of •7 scalargravitational
constant
(L/T2).
integrationinto two parts at z = Zs gives H depthof main porouslayer (aquifer or model)
(L).
i, k unit vectors,horizontal and orthogonal.
S(z,y)= Sre-y/2 {•2(q",fo
•'s
0)•zz©•(z- z',y)dz' j unit vector, directedverticallyupwards.
k Darcypermeability
(L 2).
ko mainaquiferpermeability
(L 2).
kmin minimum permeabilitysupportingconvection
q-
e-y/2
•s'
0 q" ,
•zz©•(z- y) d,' in boundary
layer(L 2).
L, L e dimensionsof model.
or, using(AI2) to evaluatethe time derivative,the solutionfor l, l•r intrinsicdiffusive/convectivelength scales,equal
the spatial and temporal developmentof the boundarycon- to D/u c, D M/u c.
centrationprofile is M dimensionless fluid mobility,equal to (k/e)/
(ko/Pr).
Sr -y/2 n coordinatenormal to boundary.
S(z,y) = 2yr•/2
e p pressure
(M/LT2).
P pressureand gravityhead, scaledto #ApH.
Pe P6clet number for Hele-Shaw cell.
' ©2(z',0)(z- z')3/2y
exp- 4(z-z') q Darcy volumeflow rate (L/T).
Rs macroscaleRayleighnumber.
+ e-V/2©•(z- zs,y) (A19) Rt, Rayleighnumberscaledto b.
Ra Rayleighnumber of salineboundarylayer,
The first term on the right-handsideof (A19) doesnot involve equal to Uc/e.
singularitieswhen z > Zs, and is readilyintegrated,numeri- Rac criticalvalue of Ra.
cally if necessary. S normalizeddensitydeviation,equal to (p -
Expressions for the spatialfirst derivativeOS/Oyfollow di- Pr)/AP.
rectly from the aboveresults.For z _< zs, Sr scaledbackgrounddensity,equal to (Pr -- PO)/
1 as o Ap.
-- [e-y/2©2(z,y)] = -1/2(z - y + 2)e-y S• S value of ponded surfacewater.
Sr Oy Oy
s smallperturbationto S.
2 y2 t time (T).
y-z- (•)•/exp
ßerfc
(2•7•) - 4z
+r2)(A20)
(-1/2y ts
T
time to saturation(T).
time scaledto H/u•.
When z > rs, T•, time scaledto b/u•.
u vectorproportionalto massflow rate
os
(M/L2T).
oy (%y)= 2rr,/2 Sr •0
•$
e-•/2 ©2(z',
0)(z- z')3/2 dz'
[1- 1/2y u scalarmassflowrate(M/L2T).
Uc scaleof massflowrate•/#ko/vr(M/L2T).
U vectorproportionalto massflow rate, equal to
- 1/2y2/(z-
z')]
exp(-y+(*_
_7
r_ 4(r- r')
v'
U/l,[cß
smallperturbationto velocityin the vertical
direction.
- 1/2e
-yerfc (z- Zs)
•/2' X, Y, Z coordinatesscaledto H; Y directedvertically
upwards.
Y• vertical coordinatescaledto b.
- [rr(z-iZs)]
•/2exp(-1/2y- y2
+(•._
•.s)2.)
4(r - rs) Ys coordinateof lake bed surface.
x, y, z coordinatesscaledto 8 = D/e; y directed
(A21)
vertically downwards.
V vector operatordel, definedin current
Notation
coordinates
(L- • or dimensionless).
a wavenumberof smallperturbationsscaledto 8, O/On derivativenormal to boundary.
equal to 2rrS/X. a wavenumberof small perturbationsscaledto l
b plate spacingof Hele-Shawcell (L). or l:u, equal to 2rrl/X or 2rrl•4/X.
•/ maximumproportionaldensitychange,equal to evaporiteformation, Palaeogeogr.

Palaeoclimatol.Palaeoecol.,54,
21-41, 1986.
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19447973, 1997, 6, Downloaded from https://agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1029/96WR03533 by Cas - Shanghaitech University, Wiley Online Library on [27/10/2022].

Convection in groundwater below an evaporating salt lake:

Abstract. Convectivegroundwatermotion can be generatedin aquifersbeneathand

Figure 1. Crosssectionof a saltlakemargin,showing

outcomesare dramaticallydifferent and define the environ- Op

with k o beingthe Darcy permeabilityof the aquifer.From (6)

lake surfaceleads to a nonuniformupward flux through the computationalsolutionmethodsfor the discretizedequations

or to the diffusionlength scale I. We write a and a as the

Evaporation an angle 0 to the horizontal as indicated in the end view, in

Table 1. Hele-Shaw Cell Parameters

Cell input configuration single single double -..

Table 2. ExperimentalDetails of Critical StabilityExperiments

most of the flow was oriented vertically acrossthe boundary. A

Numerical Simulations Compared

0.08 Considerthe linearizedstabilityequationsobtainablein the

Appendix B: PossibleEffect of Taylor Dispersion y=0:S=l y -• •: S -• 0 (A7)

usingthe discretizedversionof the normalizedTaylor disper-

v.u=0 (A1) O•r•rs:y=O'S+Sr+•=O y•:S•O

SinceDuhamel'stheoremis valid for differentialoperatorsof d scaleof elementsof numericalmesh(L).

•/ maximumproportionaldensitychange,equal to evaporiteformation, Palaeogeogr.

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