Assessment of the applicability of DFT methods to [Cp*Rh]-catalyzed hydrogen evolution processes

The present computational study provides a benchmark of density functional theory (DFT) methods in describing hydrogen evolution processes catalyzed by [Cp*Rh]-containing organometallic complexes. A test set was composed of 26 elementary reactions featuring chemical transformations and bonding situations essential for the field, including the emerging concept of non-innocent Cp* behavior. Reference values were obtained from a highly accurate 3/4 complete basis set and 6/7 complete PNO space extrapolated DLPNO-CCSD(T) energies. The performance of lower-level extrapolation procedures was also assessed. We considered 84 density functionals (DF) (including 13 generalized gradient approximations (GGA), nine meta-GGAs, 33 hybrids, and 29 double-hybrids) and three composite methods (HF-3c, PBEh-3c, and r²SCAN-3c), combined with different types of dispersion corrections (D3(0), D3BJ, D4, and VV10). The most accurate approach is the PBE0-DH-D3BJ (MAD of 1.36 kcal mol⁻¹) followed by TPSS0-D3BJ (MAD of 1.60 kcal mol⁻¹). Low-cost r²SCAN-3c composite provides a less accurate but much faster alternative (MAD of 2.39 kcal mol⁻¹). The widely used Minnesota-family M06-L, M06, and M06-2X DFs should be avoided (MADs of 3.70, 3.94, and 4.01 kcal mol⁻¹, respectively).