The advancement of porous bimetal nanostructures for electrochemical CO2 utilization to valuable products: Experimental and theoretical insights

• Fundamental and mechanism of electrochemical CO 2 utilization to valuable products. • The synthesis strategies of engineering porous bimetal (PBM) nanostructures • The current advances on PBM nanostructures for electrochemical CO 2 utilization. • Experimental, in-situ analysis and theoretical studies of CO 2 utilization. • The performance of PBM nanostructures is viable for practicable CO 2 utilization. The growth of coherently engineered porous bimetal (PBM) nanostructures shows great progress in electrochemical carbon dioxide (CO 2 ) utilization. This is due to their remarkable catalytic and physicochemical merits that present an encouraging approach for CO 2 conversion into valuable products (i.e., fuels and chemicals). Hence, this review presents recent advances in experimental, in-situ analysis and theoretical studies of PBM electrocatalysts, including PBM Cu-based and PBM Cu-free electrocatalysts, toward CO 2 reduction reaction (CO 2 RR) and comprehend its fundamental mechanisms. Various synthesis strategies were utilized to construct PBM nanostructures with distinct compositions, morphology, and synergism for excellent CO 2 RR activity, stability and product selectivity. As corroborated by theoretical calculations that revealed beneficial electronic features and reaction routes with facile adsorption energies for reactant (CO 2 ) and intermediate species on the various active sites of PBM nanostructures in easing the CO 2 RR. Future research efforts should establish robust framework for experimental, in-situ analysis, theoretical simulations and automated machine learning in developing next-generation electrochemical CO 2 utilization technologies with PBM nanostructures. Finally, this study emphasizes the potential of PBM nanostructures for efficient electrochemical CO 2 utilization and provides a pathway to sustainable and inexpensively viable carbon-neutrality. The recent exploration of porous bimetal nanostructures, via various synthesis strategies with tuned physicochemical merits, is viable for practicable CO 2 utilization to valuable products/chemical