diff --git a/release.nix b/release.nix
index 5230d6b..b49beda 100644
--- a/release.nix
+++ b/release.nix
@@ -81,7 +81,7 @@ in let
       # The nix provided nix/unpack-channel.nix function extracts the nixpkgs from the channel,
       #
       nixpkgs =
-        ( import <nix/unpack-channel.nix> rec {
+        ( pkgs.callPackage ./unpack-channel.nix { } rec {
            name = "nixos";
            channelName = "${name}-${version}";
            src = channel + /tarballs + "/${name}-${version}${nixpkgsVersion.suffix}.tar.xz";
diff --git a/unpack-channel.nix b/unpack-channel.nix
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..13d7198
--- /dev/null
+++ b/unpack-channel.nix
@@ -0,0 +1,45 @@
+# Hydra runs the newer nix which doesn't have corepkgs/unpack-channel.nix. The nix-daemon runs the older nix which
+# doesn't have builtins:unpack-channel. This means
+#
+#  - for now we need to provide the older corepkgs/unpack-channel.nix
+#  - in the future we should switch to src/nix-channel/unpack-channel.nix
+
+{ bash, coreutils, gnutar, xz, gzip, bzip2 }:
+
+let
+
+  tarFlags = "--warning=no-timestamp";
+
+  builder = builtins.toFile "unpack-channel.sh"
+    ''
+      mkdir $out
+      cd $out
+      xzpat="\.xz\$"
+      gzpat="\.gz\$"
+      if [[ "$src" =~ $xzpat ]]; then
+        xz -d < $src | tar xf - ${tarFlags}
+      elif [[ "$src" =~ $gzpat ]]; then
+        gzip -d < $src | tar xf - ${tarFlags}
+      else
+        bzip2 -d < $src | tar xf - ${tarFlags}
+      fi
+      if [ * != $channelName ]; then
+        mv * $out/$channelName
+      fi
+    '';
+
+in
+
+{ name, channelName, src }:
+
+derivation {
+  system = builtins.currentSystem;
+  builder = "${bash}/bin/sh";
+  args = [ "-e" builder ];
+  inherit name channelName src;
+
+  PATH = "${coreutils}/bin:${gnutar}/bin:${xz}/bin:${gzip}/bin:${bzip2}/bin";
+
+  # No point in doing this remotely.
+  preferLocalBuild = true;
+}