Copper-based homometallic and heterometallic binuclear complexes for electrocatalytic CO

A series of copper-based binuclear complexes were synthesized and investigated as homogeneous catalysts for the electrochemical reduction of carbon dioxide. Introduction of the second metal site systematically tuned the electronic structures of the complexes to regulate the catalytic performance, giving a faradaic efficiency (FE) of 71% for formic acid with a Cu-Cu complex and an FE of 17% for hydrocarbons with a Cu-Co complex.