Almost half of British Columbians support a massive oil pipeline proposed to pass through the northern part of the province, according to a poll commissioned by the company behind the project.

Forty-eight per cent of people polled by Ipsos Reid in the survey say they support or "strongly" support the Enbridge Northern Gateway pipeline proposal, and that ratio grows to 55 per cent in Northern B.C. Thirty-two-per-cent of respondents oppose the project.

That's welcome news for Enbridge, which has taken sustained fire over the project from environmentalists, First Nations groups and celebrity activists like Leonardo DiCaprio, Robert Redford and Kevin Bacon.

"British Columbians are much more open-minded on the project than our opponents would have people believe, and I think that's good context going into the public hearings next week," Enbridge spokesman Paul Stanway told CTV News.

A decision on the pipeline is more than a year away, but community consultations begin this month. The proposal is being endorsed quietly by governments in Ottawa and Victoria.

The Northern Gateway project would pump half a million barrels of bitumen from the oil sands in Alberta through to Kitimat, where it would be loaded onto supertankers bound for Asia.

A clear majority of those polled by Ipsos Reid -- 55 per cent -- said they are not familiar with the project, and about 20 per cent said they are undecided on whether to support it.

University of B.C. forestry professor George Hoberg says the lack of general knowledge about the pipeline calls the results of the poll into question.

"It's not really relevant what they think of it, one way or the other," he said. "I would look for a poll after we've had more significant public debate."

He also said that the question used by Ipsos Reid pollsters doesn't mention any of the debate over environmental impacts, and the results should therefore be taken with a grain of salt.

The biggest benefits of the project mentioned by those polled are employment and economic growth, advantages pointed out by 51 per cent of people.

While Hoberg acknowledges that the pipeline will bring lots of money and jobs into Canada, he says B.C. won't necessarily reap those rewards. While there will be a "burst" of construction jobs available in this province, he says there will be little long-term employment.

"Most of the economic benefits of the project, which would be very substantial, are going to oil sands producers in Alberta. They're not coming to British Columbia," he said.

Environmental concerns were the biggest worry for those polled, and were mentioned by 43 per cent. Twenty-one-per-cent mentioned the risk of spills or leaks as a disadvantage to the project.

Activists believe the pipeline would threaten the Great Bear Rainforest -- the only place in the world where the white spirit bear can be found -- and say a spill would devastate the pristine coastline and valuable fish stocks.

Enbridge supporters dispute environmentalists' claims and argue that safeguards like buried pipelines and double-hulled super tankers should mitigate any concerns. However, the risk of a spill cannot be completely eliminated.

Dogwood Initiative, a Victoria-based environmental group, says its own polls show that a majority of British Columbians oppose allowing oil tankers in the inside coastal waters.

"What today's [Ipsos Reid] poll indicates is that some people aren't automatically connecting this project to the increased threat of oil spills. The big question is whether people are willing to take that risk with their coast," Dogwood campaign director Eric Swanson said in a release.

The Ipsos Reid online survey of 1,000 British Columbians was conducted between Dec. 12 and Dec. 15. It has a margin of error of plus or minus 3.1 percentage points, 19 times out of 20.

With files from CTV British Columbia's Shannon Paterson