Ought mainstays (people recurring in a piece of academic writing) be abbreviated?
I've never seen this in academic writing, ever.  At minimum it will be confusing, and some people might find it rude to obscure people's names like this.  

Don't do it.  Just write out the surnames on each reference.  If they're long, so be it.  

If your main goal is to avoid keystrokes and typos, use an autocomplete or "abbrev" feature of your word processor or text editor, or some sort of macro expansion.  But don't impose it on the reader.

(I think in some fields it might be acceptable to refer to authors of the paper this way.  "One of us (NE) previously investigated this question..." And in some cases, you see initials used to refer to individuals who are anonymous, such as patients or  study participants.  "R.Z. is a 59-year old female who presented with shortness of breath..."  But I've never seen initials used for non-anonymous third parties as you suggest.)