The influence of NaOH on the pyrolysis process of cellulose and properties of resulting carbon based on the mixture of microcrystalline cellulose with NaOH and cellulosic gel were studied. During carbonization from 500 up to 900 °C with increasing heating rate (from 2 up to 20 K/min), carbon yield of the resulting microcrystalline cellulosic carbon was decreased to 18 %, whereas carbon yield of cellulosic gel from the mixture of NaOH was around 25%. Kinetic calculations of microcrystalline cellulose pyrolysis by using Starink method show fluctuations of activation energy at the end of reaction, where the activation energy for cellulosic gel is stable with increasing conversion. Presence of NaOH leads to higher reactivity at low temperature. Non-linear regression calculations showed that during pyrolysis cellulosic materials requires less activation energy then microcrystalline cellulose to start the decomposition reaction (from 227 to 97 kJ/mol). In the case where alkaline are present, activation energy is decreased at low conversion levels).