Jaime Menéndez-Sánchez
Researcher
Orkestra - Basque Institute of Competitiveness
Jaime Menéndez-Sánchez (he/him) is researcher at the Energy & Environment Lab of Orkestra - Basque Institute of Competitiveness, where he works on public-private projects in collaboration with major industrial stakeholders and policymakers in the Spanish energy sector.
These projects cover different areas, like energy policy and regulation, sustainable mobility, critical infrastructures (power smart grids, hydrogen, CO2, etc.), business sustainability, industrial decarbonization strategies or energy geopolitics, among others. Ultimately, the purpose of these projects is to reinforce the linkage between regional competitiveness and the global energy transition. He worked previously at the Department of Sustainability and Innovation of EDP Spain.
Jaime studied mining engineering (major in energy) at the University of Oviedo and he is finishing a PhD on Business Management and Innovation at the University of the Basque Country.
Participates in
TECHNICAL PROGRAMME | Energy Leadership
In order to gain a comprehensive understanding of this complex issue, this analysis demonstrates the application of the sustainable business model archetypes framework to the O&G sector, following the methodology defined by Yip and Bocken (2018) for different industries. In particular, our work takes as case study an O&G company with large socio-economic importance in the Basque Country region (Spain), gathering information via semi-structured interviews.
The research results indicate that a sustainable transformation of the O&G business rely on a combination of existing techno-industrial capabilities (namely related to energy and material efficiency and large-scale industrial processes) with new growing capabilities (mainly regarding circular economy and renewable energies). As a whole, unlocking the synergies of these combined capabilities requires adopting a stewardship role within the regional industrial ecosystem, which allows widening the decarbonization initiatives with a cross-sectorial approach (Menéndez-Sánchez et al., 2025).
In particular, industrial clusters associations play a foundational role in building this cross-sectorial decarbonization stewardship role in the region. Therefore, our analysis aims to gain a deeper understanding of two major industrial decarbonization initiatives in the Basque Country region: the Basque Hydrogen Corridor and the Net-Zero Basque Industrial Super Cluster. Both are public-private multi-stakeholder collaboration initiatives based on industrial clusters engagement, in which the company chosen as case study is involved in a leading position. The central role of industrial clusters channels cross-sectorial efforts for shared sustainability targets.
Overall, adopting this regional stewardship role suggests a key competitive advantage for O&G companies in overcoming political and social resistance to industrial decarbonization initiatives, with unexplored and promising implications for stakeholder engagement, long-term value creation and corporate reputation.
References:
Herzog-Hawelka, J., & Gupta, J. (2023). The role of (multi)national oil and gas companies in leaving fossil fuels underground: A systematic literature review. Energy Research & Social Science, 103, 103194. doi:10.1016/j.erss.2023.103194
Menéndez-Sánchez, J. Fernández-Gómez, J., Araujo-de-la-Mata, A. (2025). Understanding the role of oil and gas companies in the current sustainability trends: an application of the sustainable business model archetypes, Cambridge Journal of Regions, Economy and Society, Volume 18, Issue 1, March 2025, Pages 57–78, https://doi.org/10.1093/cjres/rsae042
Roberts, R., & Flin, R. (2020). Unlocking the potential: Understanding the psychological factors that influence technology adoption in the upstream oil and gas industry. SPE Journal, 25(01), 515–528. doi:10.2118/198903-PA
Yip, A. W. H., & Bocken, N. M. P. (2018). Sustainable business model archetypes for the banking industry. Journal of Cleaner Production, 174, 150–169. doi:10.1016/j.jclepro.2017.10.190.
