[1] The first synthesis was described by Wilhelm Will in 1914, using the reaction between the potassium salt of tetranitroethane with nitric acid.

[2] A practicable method for industrial use starts with furfural,[3] which first undergoes oxidative ring-opening by bromine to mucobromic acid.

[4] In the following step, mucobromic acid is reacted with potassium nitrite at just below room temperature to form the dipotassium salt of 2,3,3-trinitropropanal.

The thermal decomposition of hexanitroethane has been detected at 60 °C upwards in both the solid and solution phases.

For the solid, the following reaction can be formulated:[5] For the decomposition in solution, tetranitroethylene is first formed and can be trapped and detected as a Diels–Alder adduct, for example with anthracene or cyclopentadiene.