An aluminum company that sells aircraft components, largely to Boeing Co., is closing its local plant and laying off 163 people.

Howmet Aluminum Casting Inc., a Darien, Conn.-based subsidiary of Alcoa Inc., is consolidating its aluminum casting division by closing its facility in City of Industry and moving the work to its other five plants, according to Jerry Markham, general manager of local plant. The company’s other factories are in Bethlehem, Pa., and Hillsboro, Texas, as well as Canada and France.

The first City of Industry workers will be laid off in December with a final closing date in June 2002. “We’ve got a couple of plants that don’t have enough work in them, and we’re closing one plant so we can absorb the work in this facility and put it in other facilities,” Markham said.

About 85 percent of Alcoa’s aerospace business is in commercial aircraft, and one of Howmet’s largest local customers is Boeing’s commercial aircraft group. Boeing is expected to lay off 30,000 people companywide, or 15 percent of its workforce, by the end of 2002 largely due to declining commercial jetliner orders. Last week, the company lost the long-anticipated $200 billion Joint Strike Fighter defense contract to Lockheed Martin Corp.

Markham said the company opted to close its plant in City of Industry because it has the least ability to expand.

Aluminum production orders are way down nationwide. September 2001 production was at 206,000 metric tons, down from 291,000 metric tons last September, according to The Aluminum Association Inc.