To provide an apparatus for monitoring a steam plant and an operating method thereof.

A monitoring apparatus for a steam plant comprises a sensor unit 110 associated with a component of the steam plant, and the sensor unit 110 is configured to have a plurality of operating modes, each operating mode having a different resource usage, and provide an output indicative of the operating condition of the component. The apparatus further comprises a selector 130 for selecting one of the plurality of operating modes, and the operating mode is chosen based on a current operating condition of the steam plant. This invention also relates to an operating method of such an apparatus.