The basic process is to make a silica-methanol gel, replace the methanol with liquid CO2, then carefully adjust the temperature and pressure to move the CO2 into supercritical and then to gas to prevent the silica matrix from being destroyed by the liquid CO2 suddenly evaporating.
I would not have thought you could do that in such a simple piping setup. It's just a cross with a sight glass, some gauges, and drains. Makes sense, I guess, as that gives a constant volume system to make the T/P changes to control the phase. That is definitely why he replaced the methanol with CO2 - you wouldn't want supercritical methanol in such a simple setup.