Oh Christmas Tree! Oh Christmas Tree!

Folks new to the oil and gas industry often scratch their heads when they hear the term Christmas tree used in industry parlance Scenes of Christmas trees replete with twinkling lights, garland, and angels may be things of beauty, but the oil and gas industry variants are also quite impressive in their own right.

A Christmas Tree
A Christmas tree, named for its crude resemblance to a decorated tree, is defined as a set of valves, spools and fittings connecting to the top of a well to direct and control the flow of formation fluids from the well. They are manufactured in a wide-range of sizes and configurations, such as low- or high-pressure capacity and single- or multiple-completion capacity. A tree is used on both surface and subsea wells, and are commonly referred to as either "subsea tree" or "surface tree".