What is the difference between greenfield and brownfield

Typically, what a greenfield project entails is development on a completely vacant site. Architects start completely from scratch. A brownfield project is one that carries constraints related to the current state of the site. In other words, the site might be contaminated or have existing structures that architects have to tear down or modify in some way before the project can move forward.

Due to the complexity of decontaminating a brownfield site, greenfield projects are generally preferable, but not always. There are advantages and disadvantages to each that building planners need to weigh. It is a blank slate that gives architects the freedom to be more innovative and forward-thinking when planning site development. We were able to work with city planners to position the building to be as close as possible to a new transit station, and we had plenty of open space to work with because no structures existed to demolish or design around.

Some other advantages of greenfield projects include the following:. While there are a number of advantages to greenfield projects, disadvantages also exist, and they can cause project owners to consider a brownfield project instead. The main reason building owners might choose a brownfield site over a greenfield site is due to location.

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Counting carbon for a more sustainable future. M-AR — a solutions based, leading offsite contractor. Please enter your comment! Please enter your name here. What this means, of course, is that we have to make very careful decisions about what to demolish, what to keep and what to replace — just as developers do in the world of real estate. Where they have connections to the water, transportation and power grids to consider, we have to think about integrations with the rest of your stack.

For these reasons, we approach greenfield and brownfield projects differently. At AndPlus, a greenfield project means we start from the ground up with the discovery and scoping process and help to strategize the appropriate technologies and design aspects. We create an agile backlog and plan for the creation of a minimum viable product MVP , develop the working version and put it to the test. After that we work on developing new iterations to resolve operational issues identified in testing, and when we have a final product we plan for the launch.

We also provide support to the customer after launching, until they are fully at ease using the new software product. A brownfield project, however, begins with an end-to-end code audit for us to gather a full understanding of the basis from which we are building.

We provide an in-depth report from our engineering and QA teams and host a code review. This research gives us the information we need to determine the future path of the project to take the unfinished software to a point of completion.

Although the execution depends on our findings, typical brownfield projects involve continuing to work with the current technologies already in play and allow our engineers to find ways to deliver the required solution. We then insert the code into our Agile process and turn the unfinished software into an impressive application. The main disadvantage of this type of project is high capital investment, which is more often required for the hardware needed to use the application than for the software development itself.

Brownfield projects often benefit financially from the incorporation of legacy code and systems, which reduces the investment needed to accommodate the new software. This same factor can be a disadvantage, however, by preventing developers from using optimum flexibility and efficiency of design.