The siding is up now and our client has opted for HardiPlank, a fiber-cement siding that is supposed to last 50 years.....we'll see. I'm always suspicious of such claims for products that haven't been around for 50 years. That said, despite its high embodied energy (see definition below), it's often touted as an environmentally sound choice for its longevity. The cost runs about half that of wood, but wood is renewable and has low embodied energy. Nothing is free.....The roof is corrugated metal, another high embodied energy choice with a long projected life. Metal roofs are, however, proven to be long lasting, and the can be recycled essentially forever without any product degradation. Again, wood has the least amount of embodied energy associated with it, but it probably won't last 50 years.
Embodied energy (sometimes referred to as “embedded energy”) can be defined as a measure of the total energy consumed by a product during its life or complete life cycle. It includes all the energy used during mining or milling the raw materials, manufacturing the raw materials into a product, transporting the product, and installing the product, as well as finally removing or recycling the product.
Source: 50to50Wiki
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