Industrial VOC Source Reduction for Sustainable Manufacturing: Adoption Stages, Capital-Efficiency Heterogeneity and Environmental Cost Attribution

Source reduction of volatile organic compounds (VOCs) can advance sustainable manufacturing, but technology adoption, project completion, and environmental cost attribution require distinct assessment. We integrated 278 plant-level records (270 enterprises), 19 projects, and three verified cases to examine adoption stages, generation-side VOC reduction, capital efficiency, and annualized social net cost. Two sequential logistic models distinguished entry into implementation/planning from completion conditional on entry. Of the participating plants, 63.3% had entered implementation/planning, and 27.7% reported completion; 62.5% of the entered plants combined material substitution with process modification. Perceived economic benefits were positively associated with entry (odds ratio [OR] = 2.12), whereas baseline VOC emissions ≥ 3 t·a−1 (OR = 0.27) and reported technical barriers (OR = 0.45) were negatively associated with completion conditional on entry. Capital-efficiency descriptors spanned approximately three orders of magnitude among 14 calculable projects. At a 5% discount rate, a 10-year lifetime, and full attribution of project capital, the three verified cases yielded annualized social net costs of approximately CNY 2.80, −0.01, and −2.90 million per year. For one multifunctional upgrade, the modeled break-even environmental investment share was 15.1%. The framework links implementation monitoring, activity-adjusted source reduction, cost attribution, and qualitative screening for life-cycle burden shifting to support sustainable-manufacturing decisions.