Sebastian Vettel will return to the Formula 1 cockpit at the Nurburgring Nordschleife later this year as part of a special Red Bull event.

The four-time world champion, who retired from F1 at the end of last season, has spent the early part of this year away from the spotlight and spending more time with his family.

However, on Wednesday, he announced that he would be back behind the wheel as he joins up with former Red Bull team-mate Daniel Ricciardo at a special Nordschleife event that will take place on 9 September.

As part of the famous 12-hour endurance event, the historic F1 track will host the ‘Red Bull Formula Nurburgring’ which will bring together both youngsters and veterans for demo runs in a host of machinery – including F1, NASCAR and drift machinery.

Vettel will be reunited with the RB7 that he dominated the 2011 F1 season with. The car took 18 poles out of 19 races that season, as well as winning 12 grands prix. For the Nordschleife event, it will run on e-fuel to help minimise emissions.

Ricciardo will drive a Red Bull RB8 from 2012.

Speaking about the opportunity to go back to the Nurburgring, Vettel said: “The myth of the Nordschleife resonated, even if we ‘only’ drove the GP track at the time.

“In any case, it will be great fun to drive my RB7 - fuelled with e-fuel - on the Nordschleife as part of a show run.”

Vettel, who took great interest in environmental matters during his latter F1 career, has always been clear that he believed historic racing machinery could run on carbon neutral fuel.

“Motorsport is my passion,” he added. “It’s important to me to show that racing cars can run just as well and quickly with synthetic CO2-neutral fuel. And that is already today!”

Vettel also used carbon-neutral fuels for a demonstration run in Nigel Mansell’s 1992 championship-winning Williams at the British Grand Prix last year.

Vettel and Ricciardo’s runs will be the first time that F1 machinery has run at the 12.9-mile long Nordschleife for a decade.

At the 2013 Nurburgring 24-hours race, seven-time champion Michael Schumacher ran a Mercedes F1 car around the track.

The previous F1 run around there had been by Nick Heidfeld, who drove a BMW-Sauber in 2007.