In the Anthropocene, the sustainable development is remarkably impeded by the advent of techno-economic industrial revolution, urbanization, land-use changes, and expanding human population. These factors are antecedent to heavy metals (HMs) pollution, energy crisis, climate change, and linear economy. Present review aims to quest that whether disposed biomass after HMs phytoremediation, especially those of scantily explored emergent macrophytes, may be deployed as potential nature-based green biorefinery technology to address these challenges. The results revealed that macrophytes, besides HMs phytostablization, can foster renewable energy production and biorefinery. To this end, emergent macrophytes are inextricably linked with the functioning of ‘Plant Microbial Fuel Cells’ (PMFCs) in constructed wetlands (CWs) to eco-sustainably produce clean bioelectricity. Further, the coupling of HMs phytoremediation with the biorefinery and bioenergy prospects of wetland plants can catalyze circular bioeconomy for attaining the sustainability paradigm in CWs-based wastewater phytotechnology. However, the knowledge voids exist in elucidating the impacts of HMs-induced oxidative stress-on enzymatic pathway, especially those linked with macrophyte-derived lignin and sugars. In this sense, twinning HMs stress with genome editing tools like CRISPR/Cas9 and Artificial Intelligence or Machine Learning can fill the knowledge voids in lignocellulosic biochemistry, inextricably linked with biorefinery and circular bioeconomy. Last, the pragmatic addressal of existing constraints in emergent macrophytes-driven ‘water-renewable energy-biorefinery-circular bioeconomy’ nexus is the urgent need of the hour for scalable sustainable green phytotechnology. The targeted future researches in these nexus prospects are firmly aligned with the timely achievement of United Nation-Sustainable Development Goals for long-term ‘planetary and human well-being’.
Prabhat Kumar Rai (Mon,) studied this question.