diff --git a/Gemfile b/Gemfile
index 549cbf1..c5853de 100644
--- a/Gemfile
+++ b/Gemfile
@@ -2,3 +2,9 @@ source "https://rubygems.org"
 gem "vagrant", "~>1.0"
 gem "librarian-puppet"
 gem "github_api", "0.8.1"
+gem 'rake'
+group :unit_tests do
+  gem 'puppetlabs_spec_helper'
+  gem 'puppet', '3.1.0'
+  gem 'rspec-puppet'
+end
diff --git a/Rakefile b/Rakefile
index 57ac1ce..e1035c8 100644
--- a/Rakefile
+++ b/Rakefile
@@ -157,6 +157,19 @@ end
 
 namespace :test do
 
+  desc 'run openstack puppet module unit tests'
+  task :unit do
+    status = command = "export MODULEPATH=#{base_dir}/modules;export GEM_HOME=#{base_dir}/.vendor;"
+    ['cinder', 'nova', 'glance', 'openstack', 'keystone', 'horizon', 'swift'].collect do |proj|
+      Dir.chdir("modules/#{proj}") do
+      local_command = command + "bundle exec rake spec_standalone"
+      puts local_command
+      system(local_command)
+      end
+    end.uniq
+    status == ['true'] ? exit(0) : exit(1)
+  end
+
   desc 'reset test environment'
   task :reset do
     refresh_modules
diff --git a/spec/spec_helper.rb b/spec/spec_helper.rb
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..2c6f566
--- /dev/null
+++ b/spec/spec_helper.rb
@@ -0,0 +1 @@
+require 'puppetlabs_spec_helper/module_spec_helper'
diff --git a/test_scripts/openstack_test.sh b/test_scripts/openstack_test.sh
index 892add7..591ba3d 100644
--- a/test_scripts/openstack_test.sh
+++ b/test_scripts/openstack_test.sh
@@ -28,7 +28,13 @@ elif [ $module_install_method = 'pmt' ]; then
   git clone git://github.com/puppetlabs/puppetlabs-tempest modules/tempest
   git clone git://github.com/puppetlabs/puppetlabs-vcsrepo modules/vcsrepo
 fi
-# install a controller and compute instance
+
+# install gem dependencies
+mkdir .vendor
+export GEM_HOME=`pwd`/.vendor
+# install gem dependencies
+bundle install
+
 
 # only build out integration test environment if we are not running unit tests
 if [ ! $test_mode = 'unit' ]; then
@@ -40,12 +46,7 @@ if [ ! $test_mode = 'unit' ]; then
     echo 'openstack_version: folsom' > hiera_data/jenkins.yaml
   fi
 
-  # install gem dependencies
-  mkdir .vendor
-  export GEM_HOME=`pwd`/.vendor
-  # install gem dependencies
-  bundle install
-
+# install a controller and compute instance
   # check that the VM is not currently running
   # if it is, stop that VM
   if VBoxManage list vms | grep openstack_controller.puppetlabs.lan; then
@@ -75,7 +76,7 @@ elif [ $test_mode = 'tempest_smoke' ]; then
 elif [ $test_mode = 'tempest_full' ]; then
   bundle exec vagrant ssh -c 'cd /var/lib/tempest/;sudo ./jenkins_launch_script.sh;' openstack_controller
 elif [ $test_mode = 'unit' ]; then
-  echo 'we do not yet support running unit tests'
+  bundle exec rake test:unit
 else
   echo "Unsupported testnode ${test_mode}, this test matrix only support tempest_smoke and puppet_openstack tests"
 fi