Stakeholder engagement in decarbonisation and ESG strategies: Investigating global patterns of energy companies in CCUS innovation

Formulating decarbonisation strategies with carbon capture, utilization, and storage (CCUS) technologies, as well as integration of an environmental, social, and governance (ESG) strategy into the core business of multinational companies, are highly debated research areas. The former would bring an efficient medium-term solution for industrial decarbonisation but has technological and economic difficulties. The latter would incite corporate sustainability but has concerns about its financial effects. Multinational energy companies, however, face these strategic challenges at the same time. Building on a common theoretical basis, i.e., the stakeholder view, the goal of this study is to explore the interrelations of CCUS innovation, ESG performance, and external stakeholder involvement. The research focused on the largest energy companies worldwide (n = 129). Results show that more than 75 % of companies stepped into the first CCUS technology development phase within the stage-gate innovation process model (discovery). Findings suggest that corporate strategies which include external collaborations result not only in higher CCUS innovation performance, but it also results in higher ESG performance. Nevertheless, only those companies’ ESG scores benefit from CCUS innovation and external stakeholder involvement, which are at least in the first CCUS innovation phase. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first study to analyse decarbonisation strategies with CCUS innovations and ESG performance as central constructs from a stakeholder viewpoint. • Inter-organisational strategies are needed to manage decarbonisation and ESG challenges in the energy sector. • Quantitative analyses confirmed that external stakeholder involvement can accelerate CCUS innovation. • Exploiting collaboration opportunities resulted in higher CCUS innovation levels and higher ESG performance. • Higher ESG performance was shown in case of companies being at least within the first phase of CCUS innovation process.