DALTON, Ga. — Here in the "Carpet Capital of the World," the vast manufacturing plants that supply almost half the nation's carpet also pump out reams of wasted scraps that eventually wind up in landfills.

Next month, the world's largest carpet maker plans to do something about the problem, opening a one-of-a-kind power plant that will be fueled by the 16,000 tons of overruns, rejects and remnants it turns out every year.

Shaw Industries Inc. hopes the $10 million plant, which will power one of its main factories, can help the company save the $2.5 million a year that would have gone to buy fuel oil.

If the project proves successful, its designers expect it will reverberate throughout the industry and particularly this northwest Georgia town, where the hills are dotted with carpet factories, warehouses and stores.

"Everybody is watching, and we've been looking for years to find a way to convert waste carpet that makes sense," said Howard Elder, research director for competitor J & J Industries.

But Elder quickly added that others will only follow suit if the alternative energy makes economic sense. "I wouldn't think the minute it comes on and appears successful, it will proliferate in tens."

The plant's engineers say the process is environmentally sound, emitting roughly the same amount of pollution as natural gas. In addition to carpet scraps, the plant will also burn the 6,000 tons of sawdust the company produces every year from the manufacture of wood flooring.

The Carpet and Rug Institute says 4.7 billion pounds of carpet is dumped each year, filling up almost 1 percent of the country's total landfill space.

Sure, changing waste carpet into energy may seem like a shoo-in for the carpet industry. A pound of carpet has roughly the same energy potential as a pound of coal, Gary Nichols, Shaw's energy manager, said.

But years of failed attempts have long discouraged industry leaders from taking the next step.

Yet as energy costs rose, the dusty premise that waste carpet could be used to fuel production suddenly became more viable, and Nichols pleaded with the company's hierarchy to take another look at converting waste carpet into energy.

The result: Shaw Industries joined with engineers from Siemens Building Technology to design a high-tech plant they think perfects the once-faulty conversion process.

When the power plant goes online later this summer, truckloads of carpet will be stacked in a cavernous warehouse, waiting to be sent through a shredder. The remnants will then move to the gassifier, which is much like an oven and converts the scraps into a synthetic gas. The gas is then pushed through two pollution-controlling processes before it is funneled to the factory, where it can be burned much like natural gas to help create 2 million yards of new carpet a year.

Shaw, a privately held subsidiary of billionaire investor Warren Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway Inc., has 30,000 employees and recorded annual sales of $4.66 billion in 2003, the most recent revenue data available.

"Everybody supports it," said Harvey Levitt, operations manager for the city of Dalton's solid waste authority. "I just hope it works."

Carpet factory takes chance on radical new fuel: carpet