Method of forming an improved roofing material

A method of coating highly reflective granules on an adhering material of a roofing or siding material to form a roofing or siding material having an average resulting reflectivity on an upper surface of at least about 50% comprising:

• a) selecting highly reflective granules, at least a majority of said highly reflective granules are substantially white colored and have an average reflectivity of about 55-99.9%, an average hardness of over about 4 Moh's, an average opacity of about 60-99%, and an average porosity of about 0-5%;
• b) applying said highly reflective granules substantially uniformly on said adhering material until over about 95% of a top surface of said adhering material is covered by said highly reflective granules, said adhering material including asphalt, bitumen, or combinations thereof;
• and,
• c) partially embedding a majority of said plurality of highly reflective granules in said top surface of said adhering material to prevent most of said highly reflective granules from being fully embedded in said upper surface so that said highly reflective granules achieve an average resulting reflectivity on said upper surface of at least about 50%.