diff --git a/elements/fedora/environment.d/10-fedora-distro-name.bash b/elements/fedora/environment.d/10-fedora-distro-name.bash
index 4b7684be1..740bca411 100644
--- a/elements/fedora/environment.d/10-fedora-distro-name.bash
+++ b/elements/fedora/environment.d/10-fedora-distro-name.bash
@@ -1 +1,2 @@
 export DISTRO_NAME=fedora
+export DIB_RELEASE=${DIB_RELEASE:-21}
diff --git a/elements/fedora/root.d/10-fedora-cloud-image b/elements/fedora/root.d/10-fedora-cloud-image
index ed459cecd..c89e29bef 100755
--- a/elements/fedora/root.d/10-fedora-cloud-image
+++ b/elements/fedora/root.d/10-fedora-cloud-image
@@ -23,7 +23,7 @@ if [ -n "$DIB_LOCAL_IMAGE" ]; then
     BASE_IMAGE_FILE=`basename $DIB_LOCAL_IMAGE`
     BASE_IMAGE_TAR=$BASE_IMAGE_FILE.tgz
 else
-    DIB_RELEASE=${DIB_RELEASE:-21}
+    # note default DIB_RELEASE set in environment setup
     DIB_CLOUD_IMAGES=${DIB_CLOUD_IMAGES:-http://cloud.fedoraproject.org}
     BASE_IMAGE_FILE=${BASE_IMAGE_FILE:-fedora-$DIB_RELEASE.$ARCH.qcow2}
     BASE_IMAGE_TAR=$DIB_RELEASE-Cloud-$ARCH-$DIB_RELEASE.tgz