KIEV, Feb. 22 - The U.S. company Westinghouse will be able to supply its first commercial shipment of nuclear fuel to Ukrainian nuclear power plants no earlier than 2011, Natalia Shumkova, the head of the nuclear energy and industry department of the Fuel and Energy Ministry, said.

"By Dec. 31, 2010, no supplies other than those made in the light of the qualification project, are foreseen. As far as I know, today, commercial proposals are under consideration," she told the press in Kiev on Thursday.