Republic Services recently signed a deal with Nikola Motors (not to be confused with Tesla) for thousands of electric garbage trucks.

The order includes 2,500 electric vehicles, with the option to increase it up to 5,000 units.

Republic Services is the second largest provider of non-hazardous solid waste collection, transfer, disposal, recycling, and energy services in the United States.

Nikola said their trucks are expected to cruise for about 150 miles on a single charge. 

The truck is anticipated to outperform current diesel and natural gas competitors, according to the company.

Nikola also recently started building a $600 million factory in Arizona for the production of its commercial trucks. At full capacity, the facility is expected to produce 35,000 vehicles annually. 

The first round of Nikola trucks will be produced in Germany before production is moved to the Arizona plant.

There are over 100,000 garbage trucks operating in the United States every day. 

Converting even a fraction of these to electric vehicles would save taxpayers enormous amounts of cash while simultaneously lowering carbon emissions.