diff --git a/ci/setup_spack.sh b/ci/setup_spack.sh
index 9e5c872d9876dc027900cc0743b097b8fe99cbd9..b1663d780789b0ba77ae3c52fb5fd3e100ac7a43 100755
--- a/ci/setup_spack.sh
+++ b/ci/setup_spack.sh
@@ -84,6 +84,7 @@ spack/bin/spack buildcache keys \
 #spack/bin/spack buildcache update-index /buildcache
 
 curl -L https://github.com/jqlang/jq/releases/download/jq-1.7.1/jq-linux-amd64 -o /usr/bin/jq
+chmod +x /usr/bin/jq
 
 which jq
 jq --version
@@ -97,7 +98,7 @@ require=$(jq -Mrc --arg env "${environment}" '
   .environments.[$env]
    | if has("require") then
       .require
-       | map(" - spec: \(.spec)\n   when: \(.when)")
+       | map("     - spec: \(.spec)\n       when: \(.when)")
        | .[]
      else
       ""
@@ -111,5 +112,6 @@ EOF
 
 if [ "x$require" != "x" ]
 then
-  echo $require >> ${SPACK_SYSTEM_CONFIG_PATH}/packages_env.yaml
+  echo "    require:" >> ${SPACK_SYSTEM_CONFIG_PATH}/packages_env.yaml
+  echo "${require}" >> ${SPACK_SYSTEM_CONFIG_PATH}/packages_env.yaml
 fi