diff --git a/utils/scanpypi b/utils/scanpypi
index 765bfdcf6a..88fcb4a8a6 100755
--- a/utils/scanpypi
+++ b/utils/scanpypi
@@ -293,6 +293,10 @@ class BuildrootPackage():
         self.pkg_req = self.setup_metadata['install_requires']
         self.pkg_req = [re.sub('([-.\w]+).*', r'\1', req)
                         for req in self.pkg_req]
+
+        # get rid of commented lines and also strip the package strings
+        self.pkg_req = [item.strip() for item in self.pkg_req if item[0] != '#']
+
         req_not_found = self.pkg_req
         self.pkg_req = map(pkg_buildroot_name, self.pkg_req)
         pkg_tuples = zip(req_not_found, self.pkg_req)