Abstract Electrocatalytic oxidation is regarded as a promising method for producing high‐value steroid carbonyl pharmaceuticals. However, developing efficient electrocatalysts remains challenging due to the complex molecular structure of sterols. Hence, Pt‐Ni 2 P nanosheets were synthesized on graphite felt (Pt‐Ni 2 P/GF) to serve as a bifunctional electrocatalyst for both sterol oxidation and HER. Notably, Pt‐Ni 2 P/GF exhibited not only excellent HER activity but also superior sterol oxidation performance, attributed to the enrichment of negative charge on Pt. A three‐layer stacked flow electrolyzer was designed for sterol oxidation coupled with HER, achieving a high space–time yield of 46.2 kg/(m 3 h) for steroid carbonyl and H 2 productivity of 548 mmol/h. In situ experiments and theoretical calculations demonstrated that the electron transfer from Ni 2 P to Pt diminishes the intensity of adsorbed hydrogen and enhances ACTH adsorption, thereby facilitating HER and sterol oxidation. This work presents a novel approach for the large‐scale simultaneous production of H 2 and steroid carbonyl pharmaceutical intermediates.
Li et al. (Fri,) studied this question.