With Japan threatening supplies of natural rubber, President Franklin Roosevelt declared rubber a critical material. The government asked Union Carbide to find a way to make synthetic rubber. Within six months, Carbide had developed a process to turn ethyl alcohol into butadiene, one of the key ingredients.

Construction of a Union Carbide plant and a nearby U.S. Rubber plant at Institute (Kanawha County) moved quickly. By this time, Japan had cut off 90% of the U.S. rubber supply. The first synthetic rubber was shipped from Institute in March 1943, and by the end of May, one million pounds had been made. Institute was the largest government synthetic rubber plant in the U.S., producing 60% of the alcohol-based Buna-S during the war.