This year, the Yule festival has quests that reward essence items.
There is a daily repeatable quest In the Spirit of Yule that requires you to do any 10 Yule quests. (Be sure to pick up the quest before turning in any of the Yule quests.) It rewards a Pouch of Ithilien Essence Fragments. So far, I've gotten 1 or 2 Ithilien Essence Fragments and an occasional Scrap of an Essence Reclamation Scroll. Both are bound to character and can be bartered. 4 Ithilien Essence Fragments will get you a North Ithilien Essence Box, which is Bound to Account. 3 Scraps of an Essence Reclamation Scroll will get you an Essence Reclamation Scroll, which is not bound. If you have or will have level cap characters, you can earn the essence boxes on any character, even low level ones, and pass them to characters that can use them. Essence Reclamation Scrolls can be passed, traded or sold.
There is another quest A Festive Flurry (Intro) that requires you to do In the Spirit of Yule 5 times, and rewards with your choice of a rare item needed for upgrading an Ithilien Essence. There are 7 items to choose from, one corresponding to each craft profession (except prospector, forester and farmer). The recipes are basic for Anorien tier crafters, so choose one you can use. The rare items are not bound, so can be sold or passed to an appropriate crafter. The scheme for upgrading essences allows any Ithilien Essence to be upgraded by any Anorien crafter (and turned into a different essence in the process, if desired, since the result of the crafting is a token to be bartered for a new essence box).
A Festive Flurry (Intro) is not repeatable, but when you complete it, you will be bestowed the quest A Festive Flurry (Intermediate), which also requires you to do In the Spirit of Yule 5 times. It rewards with 2 of the rare item you choose. When you finish that, you will be bestowed the quest A Festive Flurry (Advanced), which is the same thing, except that it rewards with a Scrap of an Essence Reclamation Scroll in addition to the 2 rare items.
When you finish that, you will be bestowed the quest A Festive Flurry (Final), which is the same thing, except that it rewards with 2 Scraps of an Essence Reclamation Scroll and 4 Ithilien Essence Fragments in addition to the 2 rare items. Assuming this is indeed the final quest, then for doing 10 quests 20 days, you get 7 of the rare items, an Essence Reclamation Scroll (3 scraps) and a North Ithilien Essence box (4 fragments) in addition to what you get from the 20 Pouches of Ithilien Essence Fragments.
The bottom line is that you can get valuable essence items by doing 10 Yule quests a day for any level character. Level cap characters and Anorien crafters will be able to take direct advantage, but other characters may be able to save them or pass them to other characters on your account, or sell them on AH.